Life in Death
by RepeatIt
Summary: She wears the mask well, but it's only a mask, and a mask can be ripped off. As much as it hurts, as much as it stings to admit, she's been carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders for too long, and it's time to let go, let mankind fix itself. Easier said than done. [Update: the fifth part of the post-spring story has been posted.]
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Though it's been said by a lot of authors on this cite, The Last of Us is one of the most thought provoking and powerful stories in recent years, and it leaves so much open to interpretation. Although the DLC revealed some of what happened between fall and winter (and it was awesome), I can't help but speculate about both post-winter and post-spring. So, that's what this will explore. As it stands, it won't be very long, but I'd rather it not overstay its welcome, especially because it zeroes in more on one character's side of things (and, for that reason, I hope she's in character). Thanks for taking a look, and any reviews would be much appreciated. Endure and survive. **

Chapter 1: Baby Girl

The white gown doesn't suite her. It does hide the bandage on her abdomen, but her sweatpants and purple sweater could have do the same. The problem isn't that it's the wrong size. The problem isn't that the gown is in and of itself ugly. The problem is that it makes her look frail and vulnerable.

She flinches lightly as he runs his finger over the IV in her right hand. The golden bracelets twinkle alongside her earrings in the light from the bedside lamp. As gently as he can, he raises her arm, slips the bracelets onto her wrist, and sets it back down. The earrings will have to wait.

Snowflakes bounce off the window and pile on top of each other on the sill. The silence permeating the building is only occasionally broken by the padding of the nurses' soft shoes against the hallway floors.

He leans back in his chair and scratches his chin. It's late, and he should be getting home soon because he has work bright and early tomorrow morning, but he wants to be the first person who she sees when she wakes up.

A doctor comes in, looks at her, scribbles a few notes down on a clipboard, and walks back out without saying a word.

Sarah coughs quietly and instinctively rolls onto her side, but the bandage must be uncomfortable because she immediately roles onto her back again. Dirty blond hair falls in front of her closed eyelids.

The revelation that she could have died again runs through his head, the revelation that he's already had several times but that remains a revelation because it brings that same initial shock with every repetition.

Her hand squeezes his own, and her eyes finally open.

"Hey," he mumbles, pressing a cool hand to her forehead even though he knows she isn't sick.

"Daddy." She makes it sound more like a fact, a statement, than a greeting. Her soft voice is rough, and her hand searches her stomach for the stitches that mar the flesh she last remembers to be pure and soft and whole.

He kisses her cheek and tucks a few loose strands of hair behind her ears. "How're ya feelin?"

"Numb," Sarah replies, running her fingers over the bandage. "What are ya doin here?"

"What?" he whispers. "I was supposed to wait until tomorrow?"

She giggles, thinks better of it, and stops with a wince. "It's late."

"But it's still today." Joel reaches into his bag and pulls out a small box cocooned in strapped orange wrapping paper. A golden ribbon that matches her hair is clumsily tied around it. The bow is more than a little lopsided. He puts it in her free hand and winks.

"You're ridiculous," she whispers, struggling to rise up on her elbow.

"Nah." His eyebrows knit together as he gently pushes her back down.

"Then we'll need to be inventive." Smiling, she stops squeezing his hand, takes it by the wrist, and uses it to help undo the ribbon and tear apart the wrapping paper. Bits of orange flutter through the air and land atop the blanket.

He leans back in his chair when she finally unmasks the necklace in the shape of a golden Cross. "Well?"

Again, she tries to sit up, and he has to force her down. "It's awesome! Help me put it on."

Glancing at the clock and silently mouthing a thanks that he made it with a few minutes to spare, the father gently slips the necklace over her head as she feebly lifts it from the pillow.

"How do I look?" she asks, batting her eyelashes.

"Very charming." His face falls with each syllable as he again realizes that she almost died, that she had to get surgery on her birthday. She could have died on her favorite day of the year. It's like there was some kind of sick trade; she got a necklace, but she lost an appendix.

She looks down at the Cross and then back up at him. "I'd like to hug ya, but you'd have to bend down."

"Gladly." He allows himself to be pulled into her awkward embrace and releases an exaggerated groan as soon as she kisses his forehead.

"Don't be a baby."

There's a knock at the door, and he pulls away after exaggeratedly wiping his brow with the heel of his hand.

Tommy is standing in the hallway carrying another, slightly larger present and a vase with a few roses in it. "I'm so sorry I'm late. She awake?"

"Uncle Tommy," Sarah calls, not trying to sit up this time because she knows how her father will react.

As his brother hurries inside, mumbling something about visiting hours coming to a close, Joel stares at the polished tile floor. The word late has struck a cord with him, though he doesn't know why. Late. Is he late for something? Is he too late for something?

With a shrug, he turns around, but he isn't standing in the hospital, Sarah isn't recovering from her operation, and Little Brother isn't running around like the apologizing madman he was that night.

The snow is everywhere, climbing inside of his boots, biting at his face, and chilling him to the core through the wound on his waist. Heat bursts forth from the burning restaurant a few yards away, and he knows what he's late for.

Hopefully, he's not too late.

The darkness begins to fade, to turn to a lighter shade of grey. It's hard to breathe, but she doesn't mind. She's tired, and sleep doesn't sound so bad. Green eyes open halfway, and it feels like a wooden pick is being driven through her head.

Ellie tries to sit bolt upright, to make a run for the door, to escape, but her body doesn't listen because only her brain wants to live; the rest is resigned. She props herself up on her elbows, more pain erupting in her left leg and back.

David is stirring, the blood from the wound in his side pooling around him. How is he alive?

The girl looks about frantically. She needs a gun, a piece of wood that isn't five thousand degrees, a pot, anything blunt. Trying not to scream and pull him through the tunnel to complete consciousness, she gets onto her hands and knees and feels like she's going to vomit.

Under a booth, only a few feet away, is the machete.

She forces herself to crawl forwards, to make sure that her brain remains in control of her body and not the other way around. The weapon draws closer, but the pain is getting worse, and black dots dance around the edge of her vision and blurt out the patches of fire that lick at the walls and roof of the building.

A boot collides with her belly, knocking her onto her side and cracking something that she can tell should never crack. Blood squirts out of her nose and mouth when she bites down on her bottom lip.

"I knew you had heart," David chuckles, putting one hand to his side and leaning down slightly to try and catch her gaze. "Y'know, it's okay to give up. Ain't no shame in it."

Ellie ignores him, releases a few ragged breaths, and uses her elbows to claw her way forward. Her legs are limp behind her, but the bullet wound rubs against the punishing fibers of the carpet.

"I guess not," he observes. "Just not our style, is it?"

Again, he kicks her stomach, and she can't breathe at all, can't lift herself up, can't do anything. No, no she needs to breathe.

As soon as she can suck air into her lungs, he's shoving her face into the carpet and sitting on top of her. "You can try beggin'."

The world crumbles away as the meaning of those words hits home. She's alone with him, alone in a deep and endless darkness, unable to call out to anyone who might be running by and willing to put her out of her misery before this _psychopath _gets what he wants. Her head snaps back as he lets go of her hair, and anger consumes her, making her body shudder like it's back out in the cold. The desire to sleep, the ability to sleep, is gone. "Fuck you."

His warm hands, stained with red speckles, force her onto her back. Even in the heat of the fire, his breath burns her cheeks as he leans closer. "You think you know me? Huh?"

She reaches out her hand, blindly scrambling for the blade that could save her, maybe from the one thing worse than death. Her fingers curl around empty air, curl around smoke, curl around cinders being blown from the fires.

He's chocking her, curling his hands around her throat, crushing her windpipe. "Well let me tell you somethin'."

The Fireflies mean nothing, stopping the infection means nothing, saving the world means nothing. All that matters is escape, escape from him and his horrid breath and his taunting eyes and his cruel fingers.

"You have no idea what I'm capable of."

A nail taps against the handle, and she reaches again, farther, nearly ripping her arm out of its socket. She has it, and adrenaline is coursing through her veins. The blade slices through the air and buries itself in his arm.

David screams and falls off of her, trying to plug up the gaping hole in his flesh.

She's blinded by her rage, blinded by her fear, blinded by her pain, and he becomes the source of it all. The fire builds, a chandelier falls, she's on top of him, her heart is beating so harshly against her chest that she wonders how much more her ribs can take.

The hand he brings up begs for mercy, but he choked that out of her.

His head splinters apart, blood erupts from the wound and drenches her jacket in thick red. She brings the machete down again and again, and she wants to stop, but she can't. Every swing makes her feel alive at the same time that it makes her feel dead. Every swing makes her feel like she's redeeming herself at the same time that she's condemning herself. Every swing makes her feel like an old wound is closed even as new ones are opened.

Somebody calls out her name, but that doesn't stop the next swing, doesn't stop the next splintering of bone.

The arms around her waist do. "Stop, stop," the voice commands, dry and soft at the same time.

Ellie squirms away, yanking her pursuer with her. "No!"

The cuts and bruises and broken bones squeal as he pulls back and yanks her into a clumsy embrace. Tears form in her eyes that even David hadn't been able to cultivate.

"Don't fucking touch me!"

"Ssh, ssh." He lifts her off the ground, deposits her in front of his crouched figure like a package.

"No-"

"It's okay. It's me. It's me." Joel cradles her face in his hands, and his brown eyes finally capture her gaze.

It occurs to her that he shouldn't be here, that he's irritating his wound to no end, but she stops caring as everything that happened in the past few hours lands on top of her, crushing her to the ground and knocking all but the smallest sliver of life out of her. "He tried to-"

He pulls her forward, hugs her, rubs her back. "Oh, Baby Girl."

She's numb, she's cold, and she has trouble understanding what he says when he pulls back. A nod seems to urge him onwards, a nod seems to make it appear that she's got herself together, and so a nod is what forces her to stand. Despite his support, despite the arm around her waist, she trembles and sobs and doesn't stop looking over her shoulder at the corpse.

They are back out in the snow, back out in the town, and there are distant calls for support and weapons and blood. Gunshots ring out, and the sound of Clickers echoes off of the closely cluttered buildings.

Joel becomes anxious, so he tries to pick her up, but she won't let him. He looks frantically about, ducks as a bullet shatters a nearby window. Pulling her to the ground, he sees the wound in her leg, curses, tries to give her a pistol before throwing her over his shoulder.

She can't take it, she can't hold the cool metal, and she can't hold on anymore. The town bounces with every one of his steps, and it gradually grows smaller. Darkness comes at her from between the trees in the forest. She realizes that the gun falls to the ground, but there's too much darkness, and she can't see where it landed.

The bouncing is the rocking of a cradle, his heavy breathing is a lullaby, and her jacket covered in coagulated blood is a blanket. She falls asleep amidst a nightmare.

Cold and hot. She's chilled to the bone, yet she's burning up, her entire body having caught fire while encased in ice. Her eyes flutter half-open, and that's as open as they'll get. An old and sputtering electronic heater beside her head is a source of comfort and pain, soothing when it combats the cold and agonizing when it adds to the fire. "Joel?" she croaks, rolling onto her side and pulling the thin blanket tighter around her shoulders.

"Ellie," he breathes, sitting a few feet away with his back up against the wall. "Was worried you weren't never gonna wake up."

The smart-alike comeback he's expecting never comes, and he's visibly disappointed. "Where are we?"

"An old apartment complex. I think the Fireflies used to stay here; there's a whole bunch of pendants in the living room, and there's a gassed up generator in the basement."

She nods and sits up, her head swimming. "I feel funny."

"You've got a fever. I cleaned out your leg wound, so it won't get infected, but it's gonna hurt like a son of a bitch for a while." He inches closer and puts a hand to her forehead.

Ellie tries to stand, but her legs aren't cooperating, and she can barely lift herself off the ground. "Let me see your side."

His lip curls downwards. "I'm fine. Worry about yourself."

"I'm fine too."

"Stop," he commands as she again tries to rise.

Her eyes widen at the sternness in his voice, a sternness that he's never used with her before. It's harsh, but it's compassionate, sweet. Loving.

Joel sighs and unzips her jacket. "You're not okay."

She almost vomits when she sees the miniatures pools of red gluing her undershirt to her skin. Some of it has dried, become like a thick paste. Some of it is still wet, and she can feel it trickling down her side and back.

"I was able to start a small fire outside and heat up some water."

"A fire?" she exclaims, panic seizing her heart and making her leg throb. "What if they find us? What if they come back? What if they kill you and capture me? I can't go back, I can't do that again."

"Whoa." He puts his hands on her shoulders.

"Don't say that. I'm being completely rational, and you should know that starting a fire near an enemy camp is a stupid fucking idea." She tries to stand again, but the weight on her leg knocks her down, and there's a sickening stab of agony in her chest that won't fade.

"Stop," he says again. "We're miles from that place, I promise. Before I did anything, I took a walk and made sure that the place was abandoned. 'Sides, I kept the fire real small and put it in a nearby forest, away from the apartments."

She relaxes a bit and feels her eyelids fall half-closed again. "Sorry."

"The point is, there's enough hot water for you to take a bath. You should do it soon because that water'll be frigid again soon."

"You take it," she mumbles. "I don't mind being dirty."

"I need you to be clean so I can see the rest of your injuries."

"Oh my God."

"We need to be safe. Come on, now." He slips one arm beneath her upper back and the other beneath her legs and gently lifts her into the air. As soon as the blanket is gone, she starts shivering, her teeth start chattering, and all the color in her cheeks vanishes.

The bathroom is in surprisingly good shape; aside from the thick layer of dust and the ruined tiles in the back corner, everything appears normal, like this room was somehow preserved when the rest of the world collapsed. The tub is only about a quarter of the way filled, which tells her that he was sure not to leave the fire going too long.

He sets her down on the tub's edge and lightly tussles her hair. "I'll be right outside, okay? There are some clean clothes by the sink; might be a bit big, but they'll do. When you're ready, knock on the door."

Ellie watches him leave and bites down on her lip to stop her teeth from knocking together. As much as she hates to admit it, the idea of a bath is tantalizing, and she dips one toe in the water. Allowing herself to smile the slightest bit, she gingerly slips off her jacket and lets it fall to the floor in a crumbled, bloody heap.

By the time she's managed to get into the water, it's already significantly cooler. Her other clothes were nearly impossible to remove without tearing the skin from her bones, and the blood coating her from head to toe promptly turns the water a deep shade of red.

She's too tired to scrub away at it, but she's too afraid to try and take a nap. There's always the off chance that those animals saw the fire and followed her here to finish the job, to punish her for killing David and escaping-

"Fuck," she screeches, feeling that same pain in her chest again. She doesn't want to tell Joel, doesn't want him to patch her up, doesn't want to be the victim. It's unbecoming, it's demeaning, it's embarrassing, and she's already been embarrassed enough. Besides, how could she deserve sympathy when, even for that smallest fraction of a second, she stopped caring about the Fireflies, stopped caring about the whole reason she's started this journey in the first place.

When the water gets cold and the shivering and chattering returns, she lethargically scrubs away at her body with a small rag Joel gave her. Her skin is raw before she realizes how many times she's going over the same spots. Shaking her head, she rises and uses an old towel speckled with holes to dry herself off.

It's impossible not to see the gash on her left forearm, the sickly yellow skin around the bullet hole in her leg, the massive bruise forming on her rib cage, or the torn flesh on her stomach as she looks in the mirror to put on the new clothes. When she approaches the door, she's forgotten what it is she's supposed to do, so she sits on the counter and bites down on her lip to avoid groaning out loud.

"Ellie?" a voice asks after what feels like hours.

"What?" The hoarsness of her own voice surprises her.

"You almost done?"

"I've been done."

There's a quiet sigh before the door opens, and Joel holds out a hand. "Told you to knock."

She stares at him, her eyes glassed over. "Told me to what?"

He shakes his head and helps her limp into a bedroom. Chairs blanketed in dust are propped up against mustard yellow walls, a desk consumed by papers and books is in the far corner, a twin bed with far too many pillow for a normal person and enough quilts to strangle a rhinosorous is opposite a dresser missing several of its drawers. "Sit down."

Ellie can't hide the groan this time, but she scratches the back of her neck like nothing's wrong, like nothing's happened, and waits for him to finish rumaging through his backpack.

"How are you feeling?"

"Bad. Sore. Fine." The words that come out of her mouth aren't registered in her brain, and neither is the puzzled rise of Joels' eyebrows.

His one hand pats her back as he sits down, and she winces; she couldn't see that in the mirror, so God knows what it looks like. "Lift up your shirt."

"No." She crosses her arms over her chest.

"I need to patch you up."

"I'm okay."

"Ellie," he whispers, leaning closer. "You trust me, right?"

She doesn't know why he'd ask that; of course she trusts him. It's a ridiculous question, one that he shouldn't even need to think about. That's the point, she realizes. Her fingers fumble for the hem of her shirt, and she's slowly lifting it up, trying not to look at the bruises and gashes. "Make it fast."

He grimaces and grabs a roll of gauze. "Hold it," he says, pressing it down above the waistline of her pants.

"Okay."

The roll makes a scratchy sound as it unravels, as he spins it round and round her abdomen, careful to cover the deeper cuts and darker bruises.

It reaches her chest, and she cries out.

"What?"

"No-"

"Don't tell me it was nothin. What happened?" When she doesn't respond, he shakes his head and squints.

"Stop looking at me," she spits, her cheeks redening like she's exposed again, exposed in that burning restaurant, unable to move, unable to run, unable to fight, unable to breathe, unable to surive.

"Your rib is broken."

"Then fix it up already." Her tone is harsher than she means it to be, but she wants this to be done. Then she can sleep. She wants to sleep, to forget, to escape.

He finishes with the gauze, but he makes sure it's loose over the broken rib. "Alright."

She lets her shirt fall and crawls into the middle of the bed. The only way to make herself remotely comfortable is to lie on her back; lying on one side hurts her chest, lying on the other hurts a gash on her side, lying on her stomach irritates the irritated and peeling skin that coats her from the waist to the shoulders. She hates lying on her back.

Joel looks away and crosses his legs. "I'm sorry, Ellie."

"For what?"

"I wasn't there."

"You were hurt. You still are. Come and lie down."

"Not tired."

"Please?" She thinks she's asking that for his own good, but, deep down in what's left of her heart, she knows that she's asking for her own good too. As much as she wants it, sleep may be illusive tonight.

Giving her a pitiful look, he obeys and puts a protective arm over her.

She hates pity, hates being the victim, hates being the center of attention. The tables have turned; she was the protector, she was the guardian, she was the caretaker, and now she isn't. But she isn't alone anymore. "Two months."

"Huh?"

"Huh?"

"What did you say?"

"I dunno." Hissing, she grabs the quilts and pulls them up to her neck, hoping that they'll trap in the heat from the fire. Right now, she's getting chills, but she knows that they'll turn to hot flashes sooner or later.

"Get some sleep, Baby Girl. You've earned it."

Has she? How? What has she done right? She led those animals right to Joels' doorstep, got Callus killed, got herself captured, and was willing to sacrifice the entire mission for a moment of reprieve from the attack. That's not what a good person does, that's not what a hero does, that's not what she should have done.

The room is hot, the room is in the middle of an inferno, and she's coughing her head off. Eyes open, and it's morning, she can tell from the grey light coming in through the dirty and boarded up windows.

Joel is at her side, pressing a damp washcloth down onto her forehead. "Morning."

"What are you doing?" she asks, teeth chattering despite the heat.

"You're fever is getting worse. Relax."

The words are out of her mouth before she can stop them: "Am I turning?"

He pulls away and says something in response, but she can't hear him, can't feel her fingertips, her toes, her anything. It's all a blur, all a messy blur, and she's scared by this sound that sonds not unlike the moan of a dying cat. It takes a while for her to realize that that's her voice, her moaning.

Riley shows up sometimes, takes her to the mall in Boston, tells her stories about the Fireflies and Marlene and Salt Lake City. But Riley couldn't have known about Salt Lake City, so who is this? It can't be her.

Snow flakes, a blizzard, guns cocking, shots fired, red blood on the white powder, death in life, life in death. Corpses, Clickers, fungus climbing up the walls, pushing its way through windows, knocking over pots and vases and teleivision sets as it rushes forwards, consuming, destroying.

Jackson. Tommy and Maria, happy, safe behind guarded gates. Warm beds, heating, hot showers, lamps, places to read, to laugh, to live. They had real food there, not berries picked off of a bush or cans picked out of an overturned dumpster. Ellie wants to go back, to stay there forever. What she wouldn't give for real food right now . . .

"Did you say something?" Joel's voice.

Her dry eyes peel themselves open. "Hungry," is all she can say; her lips are cracked, her tongue is glued to the roof of her mouth.

"Wait a second." He grabs a can of something, but that's not real food.

She shakes her head as much as she can and claws at the blankets that are suffocating her.

"That's all we have, Ellie. How are you doing?"

"Riley?" she calls.

"Ah, shit."

He's gone, and there's nothing but white, endless and mind-numbing white. There's no rhyrme or reaosn to it, and she's lost, trapped. There are no boundaries, nothing to push against and knock down. It's devious, it's horrible, and it's nothing at all.

She wants out, she wants out now, and she's starting to forget where it is she wants to go instead. There has to be a destination, a brighter horizon, something to strive towards. Otherwise, why would she want to leave at all?

Think, think, think, she needs to remember.

Him. Joel. Her friend. Friend, right?

There's a ringing, and it's getting louder and louder and louder and louder. She wants to scream, to shut it up, to soak up the silence that she misses.

Middle of the night. Dark room, his sleeping figure beside her.

She's numb, but she's not hot, not cold, normal. But she can't lift her head, has no energy at all, no drive.

It's like he has a sixth sense, a sense reserved solely for her. "Ellie?"

"Joel."

He wipes his eyes and props himself up on one elbow. "Thank God you're alright."

It takes her a minute to realize that he's kissing her forehead, kissing her like she's his-

"You've been delusional all week, but your fever finally broke a few hours ago." He tustles her drooping red hair and smiles.

"I can't move."

"You're weak, dehydrated. I wasn't able to get you to eat anything. Don't worry, I'm gonna fix you up."

This is weird, and she's uncomfortable. "Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do you care? I'm one person, and you don't give a damn about the cure."

He stares at her, mouth slightly open.

Her eyes slowly close again, and she sighs, her body trying to return to sleep and her brain unwilling to leave this book open. "Sorry. I don't like being taken care of."

No response.

"You mad?"

He clears his throat. "No. You're right, I should pull back."

It dawns on her that she was acting the same way when he was sick, unconcsious, trapped in some kind of fantasy world. What's the difference?

Neither one of them says anything for what feels like hours, but she doesn't fall asleep, can't will herself to let go. "You there?"

"I'm here." The bed squeaks as he sits back down.

"I'm sorry."

"You already said that."

"Uh-huh." Her hand fumbles about until she finds another blanket, and she drags it over towards where she thinks he is without opening her eyes, hoping that he'll get the message.

He lies down and puts his arm around her again. "We'll stay here for a while longer until you've gotten some strength back."

"I want to see your wound tomorrow. Okay?" She yawns and puts a hand over the bullethole in her leg.

"If it'll shut ya up," he chuckles.

It takes a few minutes, right up until they both drift off, for it to dawn on them that she didn't make a joke, didn't make a witty remark, didn't say anything. She let him win.

She let him win.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: This chapter contains spoilers for the DLC, ****_Left Behind_****, so be forewarned. Though a good deal shorter than the first chapter, this one continues to explore the changes in Joel and Ellie's relationship following the immediate devastation of the incident with David. Thanks for the support with the first chapter, and hopefully its successor will carry the torch. As always, reviews are appreciated. Just for fun, a quote from the DLC . . . **

**"What's a Facebook?" - Ellie to Riley in the photo booth**

Chapter 2: Winter Wonderland

Running.

Rain hammering down on the pavement, the distant sound of truck engines revving up, shouts and orders to find the infection and terminate it. Terminate her.

She pants, feels like she's going to hack up a lung, turns into an alley, climbs over a fence, rounds a few corners, finds herself thoroughly lost, keeps running. The gun clanking against her hip feels so much lighter without that bullet in it, the bullet that's buried in her best friend's head.

There's so much blood coating her body that she can't blame the soldiers for assuming she's infected. Her blood, Riley's blood, the blood of the Runners – it all runs together, congeals, turns into a constant reminder that the rain won't wash away because it's too thick.

Ellie emerges back onto a street, sees headlights turning in another direction, pushes herself harder, harder, harder. She's nearing the place she first met the Fireflies; it's forever burned into her memory, the way there, the revelations, the questions.

The pendant bounces around in her pocket, and it seems heavier than the gun. It was all she could go back for; the backpacks were torn to shreds, the water guns again lost.

She leaps over a box, trips on a cord running across the street in front of her, falls, skins her knees, bites down as more blood wets the ground. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

The same words she whispered when the bullet was fired and the gun became lighter.

Back up, wincing, running. Maybe limping is a better word.

A bullet strikes the ground, makes her jump. "There she is! Get her!"

The voice is familiar; it's that freaky son of a bitch from the school, the one who gave her bathroom duty. What is he doing out here? He did always want her head on a platter.

She ducks into another alley, presses her back up against a pipe, is so exhausted that, now that she's stopped running, she has no idea if she can start again.

"Get out here, Kid," a different voice growls. "We know you're back there. It'll be quick."

"We'll see," the other fucker snickers.

And before she knows what she's doing, she's taking out the pendant, gently kissing it, and tossing her gun to the ground. Still panting, still feeling like death, she steps out, holds her hands above her head, smiles.

A gunshot rings out.

She doesn't feel any pain, realizes that this is how Riley – or what was left of her – must have felt. The brain doesn't have a chance to respond before it shuts down; it's a seamless transformation from life to death, one that's impossible to notice.

"What the fuck?" the schoolmaster rasps, stepping backwards and watching as his comrade falls to the ground, bleeding profusely from the head.

Ellie's mouth falls open; no, no, why isn't she dead? Who shot _him_?

Another shot rings out, the schoolmaster falls to his knees, drops his own weapon, reaches for his radio, falls backwards in sync with a final, deafening boom.

Flashlights appear on the rooftops, there's the sound of shoes scuffing against the ground behind her, and Fireflies are stepping out of the shadows.

Marlene, dressed exactly as she was the first time they met. "Ellie? Are you alright?"

The girl doesn't know how to respond, so she holds up her arm, points to the bite mark, and passes out.

Her black and blue face is pressed against the window, which is as cold as ice and makes an appropriate substitute for the frozen peas Joel keeps wishing he had. The gash on the bridge of her nose has scabbed over, her split lip is sewing itself back up, and that's all the good she can celebrate.

The cold consumed this old one-story house long before she and Joel arrived; a thin blanket of snow covers the foyer, and the meager aesthetics of every other room are accentuated by patches of ice. It's a fixer-upper to be sure.

They're holed up in the back room, the warmest room, which isn't saying much. He laid out their sleeping bags, lit a small gas lantern he found in a convenience store up the street, gathered some old pillows and torn blankets to make her more comfortable while she keeps watch.

The cold is getting to her more than it is to him; his wound is almost fully healed, and he's still on the antibiotics she got from the beast of the resort. She keeps popping painkillers that they find along the way, but she's having trouble keeping anything down; most of the pills end up in the middle of a badly discolored patch of snow.

"I shouldn't have moved you," he says, putting a pillow in front of her as a makeshift footrest.

"I insisted," she says, teeth clattering. "I'm gonna be fine."

"Ellie."

"Joel." She rolls her eyes, checks the chamber of her hunting rifle, points the barrel at the doorway. Her gloves aren't doing much to insolate her fingers; they feel like they're frozen enough to snap off. The only part of her body that is still warm, of course, is the bite on her arm, like it has it's own fever.

He smooths out her sleeping bag, puts his hand on hers. "I'll take watch. Get some rest."

"You get some rest."

"You've been taking the longest shifts every night. Come on, I'll still sit with you."

She sighs, knowing where this is going, and throws the rifle at him. "I don't need you to-Shit!"

He helps her stand, groans himself as he eases her down onto the sleeping bag.

"You alright?" she asks, looking faint, pressing a hand to her chest.

"Yeah. Bastard still gives me trouble when I kneel down."

Her eyelids feel heavy as soon as her head hits the pillow, but, per usual, she can't make them close. It's impossible to sleep, impossible to relax, impossible to do anything when her mind is too foggy to think, and her body is too worn to carry her somewhere private; as much as she appreciates his concern, it's really starting to tick her off.

He presses his back up against the wall, aims at the gun at the door. "Goodnight, Kiddo."

"Pfft." She still has to sleep on her back, and that's pissing her off too because that means she can't sleep. In fact, everything is pissing her off.

The night wears on, he tries not to doze with the gun in his lap, she stays awake. Wind whistles, snow falls, owls call. Life sucks.

Clickers.

Life sucks harder.

She props herself up on wobbling elbows, pulls her pistol out of the waistband of her jeans. "Help me up."

"Stay put," he tells her, inching forward.

"Joel, what the fuck? Come on."

"I'll take care of it."

"Dude."

"Sh. End of conversation." He vanishes through the doorway, and she can only hear him as he inches towards the foyer.

Heat rises to her cheeks. She understands trying to take the weight off of her shoulders, but this is going too far. Grunting, she grabs onto the top of a small nightstand beside her, pulls herself up, gets a solid foothold with her good leg. Up, up, up, she's standing, grimacing as pain tears through her chest and bruised stomach. "Okay. Watch out, you infected freaks."

Her hand slips into her pocket, takes out her switchblade. The floorboards creak beneath her, and she tries to crouch down, but it's pretty much impossible. Time to be particularly light on her feet, she supposes.

Out in the street, she can't find Joel, can't find the Clickers. It's silent.

Her eyebrows rise, and she limps forward, tightening her grip on the knife. It's go time; she wants to stab something, make it bleed, make it pay, though she doesn't know what for.

Arms curl around her waist, a hand clamps over her mouth, the barrel of a gun is pressed to her temple. "You miss us, you little bitch?"

Her heart pounds against her broken rib, and she feels a shiver run up her spine like electricity down a wire. It's gotta be one of David's men, one of the people from the resort.

Footsteps. "Jesus, Kev, kill her already. The Old Man's gotta be nearby."

"That's the point," Kevin responds. "We've got something he wants."

"This is ridiculous. Finish it."

"Shut up, Evan."

She struggles, feels the gun press down harder on her bruised temple, feels her entire body protest, stops. Her moan into his glove makes him sigh.

"Shut it, Kid."

If she trusted her reaction time, she'd knee him where it hurts most, slash his throat, and be done with it, but she knows she'd be too slow. The gun would go off. She'd die, and the Fireflies would have nothing to work with.

"Hey, Old Man!" Kevin shouts, tightening his grip on Ellie's waist and bringing tears to her eyes. "We got your little brat. Show yourself, or she dies."

Only the night answers with it's howling winds and never ending stream of snowflakes.

Other men walk into the street, hoods up, pistols in hand.

"No? Don't believe me?" He shakes his head, fires a shot into the snow an inch away from the girl's foot.

She doesn't whimper, doesn't make a sound, doesn't give him any satisfaction. If she's going to die, she's going to take him down with her; the knife feels hot in her hand, even though she knows it's freezing cold.

"Alright. I'm going to count to five, and then I'm pulling the trigger. One."

"For God's sake," Evan whispers. "This is idiotic."

"Two."

"We're going to get fucked."

"Three."

"Kevin!"

"Four."

"That's enough." He raises his own gun, presses it to Ellie's forehead, freezes when a voice rises from behind them.

"You should have listened, Kevin." A few shots, a few bodies, Evan goes down on one knee, arm bleeding. Ellie's captor wheels around, curses, falls backwards with a hole in his head.

Joel steps in front of the girl, takes aim at the final two men running towards the distant tree line, fires, scoffs at the newly minted corpses. "Anybody else I should be worried about?" he asks, turning to Evan.

"Screw you, Old Man."

"Not really what I wanted to hear." Joel kicks the hostage in the side, grunting and briefly clutching at the hole in his side.

"Wait," Evan coughs. "Don't. There's nobody else."

"I find that a little hard to believe."

"What do you want me to say? We've been trailing you all week."

Ellie brushes past Joel, spins her knife around in her fingers, jams it into the back of Evan's head, watches him go limp. "Mother fucker."

Joel glares at her.

"What?" she spits. "He didn't have a reason to lie."

"You mind telling me what that was about?"

"They . . ." Captured her, tortured her, almost raped her, broke her rib, shot her in the leg, embarrassed her. She spits into the snow, stalks back towards the house.

He puts his hands on her shoulders, but she shrugs him off. "I told you to stay inside."

"What is this? We back in Pittsburgh?"

"It's only been a week. You're not ready to fight."

"Stop it, Joel, just stop it."

"I thought you wanted to get to the Fireflies."

"If you die, then I won't get to them anyway. Jesus Christ." She limps into the foyer without looking at him, feels fresh tears welling up in her eyes, slowly sits down on her sleeping bag.

They almost got her again, almost killed her again. She's angry at them, she's angry at Joel, she's angry at herself for being so weak, she's tired of screwing around and having nothing to show for it. For all she knows, all the Fireflies at Salt Lake City could be dead. What then?

He stands in the doorway, mouth open like he's going to say something.

She tosses her gun to the side, lies down, closes her eyes.

"You want me to sit with you?" he asks, the tenderness returning to his voice and shoving Pittsburgh back into the depths of the past.

Not far enough. "No."

So, he drags his sleeping bag into the neighboring room, keeps watch until dawn breaks. He leaves her alone, per her request.

And she spends the night with a worsening headache and bloodshot eyes that have run dry.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Happy Saturday! This will be the penultimate chapter of the post-winter section, so chapter five will see the transition to post-spring. That section will be a bit longer, but, again, this won't be a particularly long story. Thanks again for the support, and I will try to post chapter four within the next day or two. **

Chapter 3: Dawn

Quiet country music trills from a radio knocked onto its side. Lights overhead flicker, the sheets on the dusty beds flutter in the warm breeze from the window. A cracked television attempts to come to life, but there's nothing for it to show because nobody's broadcasting. Static.

Joel is out on the balcony, tapping his foot to the beat of the song he recognizes but cannot name. He watches the steam from the pot and fire vanish into the air, untraceable. The heat is an ally today, though it remains to be seen how long that will last. The canned food can never be made appetizing, but its slightly more bearable cooked.

The music stops, the lights go out, the television gives up. For the third time, the power fails, but, if the past few hours have been any indication, it will try again soon. Where the electricity is coming from, why it's stuck on this endless loop, it's impossible to know when the answer lies in a basement filled with spores and slumbering infected.

Ellie reclines on the bed, her eyes half-closed, Riley's pendant gripped tightly in her left hand. A month into spring, a month closer to the anniversary of the trip to the mall.

"Alright," she hears Joel muttering. "You awake?"

"Yeah."

He carries her a bowl of beans, sets it on the nightstand beside the bed. "I liked that song. Too bad it keeps getting cut off."

"If you'd let me check the basement, I could try and fix it." She crosses her arms over her chest and stares at her bare feet. One of her toes has been driving her up the wall, and, now that she's done picking broken glass out of her shoes, she understands why.

"It's too dangerous. Unless I can go with you, we'll put up with it. Honestly, I'm happy we've got music at all." He tries to give her a smile, but it isn't any more reassuring than the last one.

"Not my fault you broke your gas mask."

"El-"

"I know, I know." She sniffs at the bowl, sticks her tongue out, slips the pendant back into the pocket of her cargo pants.

He sighs. "You have to eat something."

"I'm not hungry."

"You're never hungry anymore."

"See? Case closed." She wiggles her injured toe and tries to avoid looking at the cut on the bottom, but she can't; her eyes are drawn to it for some reason that she cannot fathom.

Joel pokes at his own beans with a fork and sits down beside her. "I stayed at this hotel once."

"That how you're familiar with the way?"

"Yeah. Sarah's friend from first grade moved here, so we visited sometimes. They were real close." He narrows his eyes and bits his lip after he says it, like he's revolted, like he can't believe that he allowed that to slip out. The past needs to stay in the past, no matter what. That's his maxim, but, sometimes, he doesn't seem to know how else to connect.

Ellie sits up straighter, takes a long drink from a glass of water. She can taste the dust, the age, the chapped lips of the people who used the glass before her. It disgusts her, it makes her gag, but she's so dehydrated that she has no choice; the water skins were leaking, and it was switch to a dirty glass or go without.

"You gonna waste the beans?" he almost growls, probably still angry that he brought up the world of twenty-years ago.

"No, you can have them."

"When are you going to eat?"

"When I'm hungry."

"You're not now? Really? It's been how many days?"

"Fine!" she spits, grabbing the bowl and shoving a spoonful into her mouth. Her eyes bore into his, accusing. The taste is horrible, and her stomach churns as soon as she swallows.

He looks away.

She doesn't want any more, doesn't want to do anything, doesn't want to go anywhere because the Fireflies are still so far away, wants to lie there and sink into the blankness of her mind. That should make him happy anyway; blank means no past, no reminiscing. "This stuff is shit."

"But it'll keep you alive. We've been eating this stuff since the summer."

"Maybe I'm just tired of it." She eats another spoonful, coughs, sinks back into the pillow.

"Are you sure you're feeling alright? You getting sick again?"

"No, I'm fine."

"You don't look so good."

She scoffs. "Jesus, Joel, thanks. Why don't you tell me I put on a few pounds while you're at it?"

"I wish I could."

"Fuck you." The bed squeaks as she gets to her feet, favoring her good foot, slips her pistol into the waist of her jeans, and opens the door to the penthouse.

"Ellie," he calls. "I meant because you're too-"

"I know what you meant. I'm going for a walk. Don't follow me." She slams the door behind herself, saunters halfway down the hall, sees one of those stupid little trolleys that people used to roll suitcases around on. When she curls up, she can sit on one like it's some kind of ride, and she's in desperate need of some entertainment today.

As soon as she closes her eyes and waits for the nausea to subside, she's back on the carousel with Riley. Tears well up, and Riley stares at her.

"Are you alright?" she asks, a phantom concerned about a monster.

"No!" Ellie screeches, pounding her fist against the trolley and gasping as she falls backwards. It falls with her, lands on top of her. She kicks it to the side, buries her face in the musty carpet, cries her eyes out like the pitiful little rat that she is.

Her mind isn't blank anymore; it's replaying that day, replaying the run across the scaffolding, replaying the fall, replaying the bite, replaying the anger, replaying the resignation, replaying the gunshot that ended one life and started another.

"Ellie?" It's Joel, he's kneeling down beside her, putting a hand on her back.

"What?" she chokes out, her sobs enraging her.

"It's late. You need to come back and lie down."

"Why? Who the fuck cares?" She scuttles away from him, banging her bad toe against the trolley thing.

"I do. You're really pale, and there's blood coming out of your nose."

"I don't care."

"I do," he repeats, scooping her up in his arms and carrying her back to the penthouse.

"Let me go," she groans, unwilling to fight him.

He sets her down in bed, pulls the covers over her, feels her forehead, wipes the blood away from her nose. "Wonderful," he whispers when the music starts playing again, the lights flicker overhead, and the television begins to struggle.

"I'm not sick," she assures him.

"No, thankfully, you're not. You been having a lot of headaches?" He takes her pistol and tosses it onto the couch a few feet away.

"Why?"

"Might explain the nosebleed."

She doesn't say anything, tries to curl up and make herself too small to be of any interest to him. What a stupid plan.

"Tell me the truth," he commands, fluffing another pillow and tucking it underneath her upper back.

"Yes," she confesses, burying her face in the sheets and avoiding his gaze. "There. Leave me alone."

The sound of the music overwhelms the sound of his breathing, and she wonders if she's alone on the other side of those sheets. Her heartbeat slows, although she didn't realize that it had risen in the first place.

"Ellie, can you take the sheets off of your head? We need to talk."

"Dammit," she whispers, reluctantly complying and feeling the heat rise to her cheeks. "What happened to pulling back? I thought you weren't going to fuss over me. Joel, it makes me fucking uncomfortable, and I don't know how else to tell you to stop."

His eyes widen.

She backpedals: "I'm sorry, but I can take care of myself. After all of this, why are you worried about me now?"

He scratches his chin, leans back against the headboard, squints into the distance like he's puzzled, like he's searching for answers he's never going to find in the decrepit closet of an abandoned hotel. "Because you cried."

Her scarred eyebrow rises. "What?"

"You cried. At the restaurant. You don't cry."

She makes an o with her mouth and runs a hand through her messy red hair. Her ponytail is greasy, and she wants nothing more than to find a lake and take a bath. Maybe she should take what he said as a compliment, and maybe he's right. But she cries. Everybody does.

He sighs again. "I know you're strong, and I would never doubt that. Hell, you're the strongest person I've known. But it's okay to let the mask fall away sometimes. It's necessary. If you don't then it'll fall off eventually, or somebody will rip it off."

Winston's journal. She wears the mask well.

Too well.

"I'm not trying to smother you; I'm trying to help you. You kept me alive, you kept us both alive, and you did it by yourself. I owe you." He smiles, but this one makes her nod instead of scoff.

"You would have done the same."

"But I didn't. Now, here's how this thing is gonna play out." He puts an arm around her shoulders.

She doesn't pull away.

"You're going to start taking care of yourself again. You're going to eat again. You're not going to blow me off when your nose is bleeding, or you wake up screaming, or you're so tired that you pass out in the middle of the street."

"Joel, I was fi-"

"You don't do that stuff when you're fine. I don't want to force you to talk about what's bothering you, but if it's making you sick, then we need to get it out there. The Fireflies are your endgame, right?" He tightens his grip on her shoulders, stares at her, waiting.

"Yes."

"You're no good to anybody dead."

She puffs up her cheeks and blows the air out of her lips, making the sound of a speedboat that she's never heard of or seen. Her hand again goes for Riley's pendant, and she clutches it to her chest, hoping that he won't see, won't figure anything else out about her.

Because he's right about it all.

For months now, she's known deep down that she hasn't been fine, but she's never openly recognized it, never accepted it as true. It makes as little sense to her now as it did before. She wonders if any of the dead would have seen the change, the complete shift in her personality, her demeanor, her life.

Tess? Sam? Henry?

Three pangs of guilt to the heart, three stabs, three knives, but they don't make her flinch like the fourth one.

One slip up. She fell from the scaffolding, not Riley, so why did Riley die?

She feels Joel pull her closer, and she leans her head on his shoulder. He's the only one she's got, the only reason she isn't still alone. That's not fair; he didn't ask for any of this, didn't want to be involved, and she can't escape the feeling that she guilt tripped him into it back in Wyoming.

It occurs to her that she could tell him now, tell her about how hard it is to get up every morning with the weight of five people – four dead, one still kicking – pressing down on her. She could tell him about how hard it is to catch sight of that thing on her arm and not slam her head in a door or try to cut the infection out. She could tell him about how hard it is to chase after a group that she doesn't really know to make up for the mistakes of the past.

But she keeps her mouth shut, puts the pendant away, closes her eyes, and finally falls into a light sleep.

Ellie stumbles into the bedroom, her damp hair sticking to her shoulders, her eyes red and puffy, her forearm bandaged, her weakened body barely kept warm by a pair of sweatpants and a jacket. Her stomach growls, and she perks up a bit when she sees Marlene on her bed, holding out a bowl of stew.

"How are you feeling?" the woman asks as Ellie sits down. "Headaches? Bleeding?"

"No," the girl snaps, shoveling the stew into her mouth. "My arm hurts because there's a fucking hole in it, and I feel shitty because I shot my best friend and ran around a mall for three days straight."

"Understandable."

She stretches her legs out and groans, wonders if she can snatch a gun off of one of the Fireflies and shoot herself in the head. "What do you want? I want to sleep."

Marlene fluffs the pillow and takes an extra blanket out of a nightstand, wrapping it around Ellie's shoulders. "I need to make sure you're okay."

"How am I okay?"

"As okay as you can be," the Firefly says. "You've had a rough couple of days, you're grieving, and people do crazy things because of grief."

Ellie finishes the stew, stares at the empty bowl, feels the tears welling up again. "Hey, you mean like running around a fucking mall for three days because you don't know where else to go?"

A sigh.

"I'm not going to get myself killed, if that's what you're getting at."

The woman doesn't seem satisfied, but she relents, takes the bowl, and steps into the hallway. "Goodnight, Ellie. I'm sorry for your loss."

There's no click and turn of the lock; the door is left slightly open. The girl punches the wall, feels her knuckle split. "She was your loss too! She trusted you!"

There's no response from outside.

The tears stream down her cheeks, she collapses onto her belly, cries into her pillow, cries until she can't anymore, and her body goes limp beneath the soft sheets.

"You're girl is unstable," says a voice from just outside the door. Ethan.

"She's going through a lot," Marlene responds.

"You realize she was drunk when she showed up, right?"

"And?"

"Really drunk. The doctors were worried she had alcohol poisoning."

"I don't care. She's my responsibility, and she's a good kid." It sounds like a chair creaks, somebody sitting down or getting up.

Ellie closes her eyes, tries to calm down. She doesn't want, doesn't need their pity.

"You love her so much that you're going to use her for this cure?" Ethan asks, sounding more than a little smug.

Love. Riley. Mom.

"Go fuck yourself," Marlene growls.

The hallway goes silent.

The girl hasn't slept in a real bed since she left the boarding school that night. What if she had stayed? Nobody would have been bitten, nobody would have died, nothing would have changed. "I'm so dumb."

Ellie pulls her hair into a loose ponytail, yanks her torn grey shirt down over the waistband of her cargo pants, gives her cracked reflection in the cracked mirror a small smile. Her cheeks have more color in them, she's having less nose bleeds than was the case a few weeks ago, and she's gained a few pounds now that she's keeping the food down. She's starting to recognize herself again.

Sauntering out of the bathroom, she grabs her backpack, pulls on her shoes, and meets Joel by the grocery store's checkout line. "Hi."

"Hey, Kid." He pats her on the back and gives her hand a gentle squeeze.

They leave without another word, cross the cracked parking lot with its overturned cars and abandoned shopping carts. Birds call to one another, squirrels scamper across the pavement, gaze at the man and the girl, dash away and up the drainage pipes and tree trunks when approached.

Silence isn't new to either of them, but she knows that it makes Joel uncomfortable. Sighing, she looks down at her shoes and tries to think of something to say, but she's at a loss for words. Per usual.

Salt Lake City looms in the distance, highlighted and silhouetted by the sun. One of those fallen black titans of a building is a hospital, and there are Fireflies hiding there, waiting for her, waiting for the cure, waiting for the end of the end of the world. Marlene might be there.

Feeling another small smile tug at her lips, Ellie jogs forwards to catch up to Joel and punches him gently in the shoulder. "Yo."

"Yo," he responds awkwardly. "You sleep well?"

She nods, plunges her hands into her pockets. "We almost there?"

"We'll be there by tomorrow morning."

Her smile widens, and she fingers Riley's pendant. It's finally time to make up for that night, that night where they made the stupid decision to go to the mall, and Ellie was too weak and too slow to cross the scaffolding in time.

The afternoon is hot and humid, and sweat starts to drench her shirt. "Ugh," she groans, peeling the torn grey fabric away from her pallid skin.

"You want to find somewhere to stop for lunch?" he asks, looking equally frustrated with brow furrowed and hands clenched into fists.

"Fuck yeah." She follows him into a small gas station convenience store and tosses her heavy pack onto the floor before collapsing into a chair.

He spots a broken fan on the counter and scowls at it. "What I wouldn't give for a little bit of a miracle right now."

Her eyes roam the shelves, spotting a few fly swatters. Holding back a laugh, she takes two and holds them out to him.

"What?"

"Fan me."

"Wow. Really? El, these aren't exactly going to do much good."

"They're something." She waves them in his face for a few seconds, and he chuckles, nodding in submission.

"I'm not fanning you, but feel free to keep going." Pulling over another chair, he sits down and rummages through his pack for two cans.

Groaning again, she throws her head back and drops the fly swatters to the floor. "Please? I'm super valuable, cure for mankind!"

And her face falls, the energy leaves her, she wants to punch herself in the face. Valuable. She's not valuable, only the bite on her arm. Her grip on the pendant loosens, and she hugs her knees to her chest, eyes already wet.

"You okay?" he asks, holding out a can.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She eats slowly, always avoiding his gaze, always avoiding the thought of the pendant and that moment with the water guns and the televisions blaring a re-run of static, static, static.

They finish, pack up again, and leave the gas station behind.

Salt Lake City draws closer, but it's not quite so comforting.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: This is the final part of the post-winter section, and, as such, it brings several sub plots that have been coming up throughout the story to a close. Next time I post, it'll be the beginning of the post-spring section, which begins, to say the least, in the thick of things. The support is much appreciated, as would be any reviews about this segment of the narrative. **

**"Don't go." - Ellie to Riley at the mall **

Chapter 4: Losing My Mind

Ellie sits up bolt upright, panting, sweating, shivering, thinking she's bleeding. Her left hand yanks up the sleeve covering her right forearm, and she sighs with relief when she sees that blood isn't pouring out of the little holes left by the runner's teeth. Her face falls. Relief turns to anger, anger turns to hate, and she gets to her feet, throwing her blanket to the ground and leaving the sleeping Joel by the glowing lantern.

She sits on a rock beside the road, lies down on her back, groans when it cracks. Dreams are a curse, and she wishes her mind would go blank with sleep, but it doesn't. It never does. David is torturing her, or hunting her her, or touching her, or Riley is dying, or Tess is being shot, or Sam is turning, or Henry is killing himself. There are never any pleasant dreams, never any resurgences of pleasant memories. Then again, she can't remember a pleasant moment that wasn't immediately crushed by something else she'd rather forget.

"Get it together, Ellie," she whispers into the night air. "You got this."

But what is it that she's got? Control of herself? That's a lie.

Her eyes follow the stars, follow the birds still zooming through the air in the middle of the night, follow the leaves rustling in the trees. She gets bored, rises, stretches, wanders deeper into the forest, pulls the pistol out of the waistband of her cargo pants.

Crickets, the snap of a twig, the quiet clock of one rock knocking against another, the whistle of her short and shallow breaths. She stops in the middle of a clearing, looks about, shrugs, sits down with her back propped up against a tree trunk.

A few deep breaths, but they don't help as much as she'd like. She kicks a shoe off, peels away a sock, stares at her foot, wiggles her toes, picks dirt out from underneath her nails with her finger. She wants to be clean, but she hasn't been able to find somewhere to clean herself off in a few days.

Sniffing the collar of her shirt, she sticks out her tongue and puts her sock and shoe back on. Back on her feet, she trudges through the quiet woods, hoping that she'll stumble upon a lake or a pond that's shallow enough to get the job done.

Maybe she doesn't have herself under control, maybe she doesn't got that, but she's got control of her hygiene.

And, behold, a lake, deep in the middle, shallow by the shore, fed by a small waterfall cascading over a low rock outcropping. It's like luck is finally throwing her a bone, and she'll play fetch if that's what she has to do.

Glancing over her shoulder and listening for a few moments to the as of yet unbroken silence, she smirks, tosses her clothes to the side, steps into the lake until she's up to her neck. The water isn't cold, but it isn't warm either, and she shivers. It's bearable, being dirty for another day isn't.

She dips her head under water for a quick moment, runs her fingers through her hair, listens to the droplets fall from the auburn locks to the surface of the rippling glass. It's beautiful, it's calm, and she doesn't feel like getting out, going back to the sleeping bag, returning to a nightmare and waking up drenched in sweat once again.

"Paradise," she mumbles to nobody in particular, sinks her toes into the mud below.

"Not exactly." Riley steps out of the shadows, spinning her pendant around on her left ring finger.

"Close enough."

"It isn't LA, is it? You're not surfing, and I don't think you could call this a vacation." She holds her arms out, drawing in all of Utah with a single gesture.

Ellie dunks her head again, blows water out of her nose. "You know what? I'll go on vacation after this. Joel and I."

"Where?"

"I dunno. I think I want it to be permanent."

The older girl laughs, sits down on the shore, starts rummaging through the pockets of Ellie's jacket. "Yeah, you aren't exactly yourself lately. You feel alright?"

"I miss you."

Riley sighs, puts the jacket down, leans back on her elbows. "I miss you too, El. But you shouldn't be killing yourself over me."

"It's only fair."

"Not really."

Ellie scoffs. "I killed you, didn't I?"

"No."

"Yes."

"No, you didn't."

She peers into the surround darkness, listens, gets out of the water, uses her jacket as a makeshift towel, pulls on her clothes and rubs her arms up and down her arms to wipe away the goosebumps. "I'm kinda a dick."

"Here we go," Riley whines, kicking a rock into the lake. "How many times we gotta go through this? You think I would have wanted this?"

"Me to help the Fireflies? Yeah, pretty sure you would have wanted that."

"Like this? What if you die?"

"Then we'll see each other again." Ellie puts her hair back into a ponytail, shakes her head from side to side to dry her auburn locks.

The other girl raises her eyebrows. "You don't get it, do you?"

"Get what?"

"It isn't about me anymore."

"It's always about you."

"But you've got somebody else who needs you now. It sure as Hell wasn't about me when you were patching him up and taking care of him during the winter."

Ellie flinches. "Don't talk about that."

"What? I'm wrong?"

"No, but you matter more to me."

"Do I? Why does somebody have to be more valuable? Is it because I'm dead?"

Her mouth opens, but there are no words to say, no answers to give.

Riley grins. "Got you, didn't I, Baby Girl."

Ellie's cheeks burn, and she turns away, fingering the pendant. She does care about Joel, she does, but the fact of the matter is that he isn't dead, she doesn't owe him. Or does she? It's her fault that Tess is dead.

"No, that's not true," Riley says, standing and brushing herself off.

But it is.

"Nope. You have guilt about everything, don't you? Why can't you look at yourself and see that you're a good person?"

"Because I'm not," Ellie mumbles, closing her eyes.

The older girl holds her friend's hand, leads her to the very edge of the shore. "Open your eyes. Do it."

"No."

"Do it."

She complies, scoffs, stares at the image in the still water. Only one person. Only her.

"What do you see?" Riley asks.

"Just me." Tears well up and threaten to spill over, but Ellie blinks furiously until they dry up and die. She's been weak enough as it is, and it's time to stop crying.

A laugh. "Yeah, but what do you see? Be honest."

Joel can't ever hear this, can't ever be allowed to see how far she's fallen, how confused she is. But Riley isn't like Joel, Riley isn't like her . . .

Father?

Dad?

No, he's Joel. And who is Riley? A friend?

"Stop thinking about me," the other girl says. "What do you see? Tell me."

"A monster," Ellie blurts out.

She thinks she should feel better, should be breathing a sigh of relief, but she doesn't feel better, and she's not relieved, and she's getting more and more frustrated. "That's all I see," she whispers, spits into the lake, scoffs again as the ripples overtake and distort her reflection.

"I'm not your friend." Riley cocks her head to the side, smiles.

"What? I thought you were trying to help me. Now you're telling me that we weren't even friends? What about that night at the mall, huh? You didn't pull away."

"No. I didn't. Cause I'm not your friend." She leans forward, their lips meet, and Ellie's eyes only widen for a second before they close.

Salt Lake City is forgotten, Joel's camp on the road is forgotten, David is forgotten, Henry and Sam are forgotten, the dam is forgotten, Tess is forgotten, the bite is forgotten. This isn't real, but it feels real, and that's what matters, that's what has to matter.

Riley pulls back, smiles, tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear. "I'm a little bit more than that."

Ellie blushes, stares down at her shoe, sighs for a long time. "Fuck. You're only in my mind."

A hand on her shoulder, foreheads pressed together. "Then your mind has some doubts about how bad you are, doesn't it?"

The immune girl is alone, standing on the shore, hair still damp, arms hanging limply at her sides, mouth agape. She stares up at the sky again, squints at the moon.

The full moon.

Joel watches the flame dance from side to side within the lantern. He heard her get up, heard her make her way into the woods, didn't try to follow her, won't try to follow her. When she's breathing like that, talking to herself like that, it's like she's in another world, and trying to get to her will only lead to an argument.

She'll return when she's ready.

"You don need to keep telling yourself that."

He pulls the lantern a bit closer, lies back down, takes a deep breath, runs his fingertips over the cracked face of the watch.

"Daddy." Sarah sits down beside him, still dressed in her blood-stained pajamas, puts her hand atop his.

"Baby, not tonight. Alright? I'm tired, and I'm just waiting for Ellie to come back."

"You're paranoid; she's fine, you know it, ya keep thinkin it." She lies down on her side, props her head up on her arm, smiles, widens her big grey eyes.

He hears a twig snap, glances over at the woods, waits, sighs when nothing emerges from between the thick trunks. "Screw it," he says, putting an arm around his daughter and pulling her closer to him.

"Ya know what you should do?" She rests her head on his chest, curls up into a ball.

"What?"

"Teach her how to play guitar when this whole . . . odyssey is over."

He snorts. "Odyssey?"

"I know how to use big words, and I'm serious."

Joel purses his lips, scratches his chin. "Might not be a bad idea."

Sarah claps her hands, giggles. "Where are ya gonna take her? Back to Uncle Tommy's?"

"Yeah." He knows Ellie will like it there. It'll be weird at first, and she'll have a hard time adjusting, but she'll do it all the same because she's the strongest person he knows. If she can save the world, she can handle civilian life.

"Okay, okay, are you gonna sing for her?"

He sighs. "Oh, God, don't bring that up. I think she's forgotten."

"Really?" Sarah asks, giving him a knowing grin. "You think _she _forgot?"

"Not exactly, but I can dream."

They laugh, watch the stars, stare up at the full moon. It's like they're home again on the back porch, only they don't have lawn chairs, Sarah's up way past her bed time, and they're waiting for somebody other than Tommy.

She yawns. "Can I ask you somethin personal?"

"Sure."

"Did you see me as soon as you met her? Is that why you were mad?" She rolls over onto her back, folds her hands atop the gunshot wound in her belly.

He doesn't respond for a few moments, not because he can't, not because he doesn't want to, but because he knows that she'll be gone again soon, and he wants to drag this conversation out as long as humanly possible. Unless Ellie comes back. "Yes. But I don't see you anymore, Baby. She's Ellie, and she'll always be Ellie."

"What does that mean?"

"That she's her own person, that's all." He squeezes her hand, kisses her dirty forehead.

"Good."

"Why do you have to ask me that every time I see you?" Another kiss on the cheek, his fingers intertwine with hers.

She stares at him. "Because you like to know that I approve."

"Jesus!"

Sarah is gone, Ellie's slim form materializes from the darkness of the woods, rubbing her arm and muttering curses under her breath.

"Fucking pricker bush. Fucking rocks in my shoe. Fucking fuck." Her green eyes sparkle in the light of the lantern, and she sighs when she sees him.

"Hey."

"Man. Did I wake you up? Sorry, Joel."

"Nah, I was up already."

She nods, sits down on her sleeping bag, kicks off both her shoes, pulls her thin blanket up to her shoulders. "Big day tomorrow, huh?"

He leans over and tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear. "Did you take a bath?"

"Yup," she chirps, knocking his hand away. "There's a little lake a few minutes' walk from here."

"Good. Cause you stunk."

She sits up, hits him in the arm. "Shut up! You know, you do not know how to flatter a woman. First, you called me fat-"

"I didn't call you fat."

"Really? Back at the hotel?" She puffs up her cheeks and blows air out of her lips, glancing around innocently.

Joel shakes his head. "I never said that."

"Oh, but I haven't forgotten," she whines melodramatically. "That's why I picked these clothes from that store a few miles back; they're slimming."

"What?"

"I mean, now I look hot, but before . . ."

"Will you cut it out?"

"Cut what out? Bad foods? Are you suggesting a diet?"

He pulls her against him, tussles her hair.

"Ah!" she yelps, laughing and pretending to fight back. "Let me go!"

"Nah."

"Joel!" She accidentally kicks the lantern onto its side, and the light goes out. Her mouth turns into a small o, and she giggles. "Oops."

Not trying to hide his smile, he releases her, shrugs. "We should go to sleep anyway. Maybe that was a sign."

Her face falls, and her green eyes are once again glassy. "Maybe it was."

The quiet hum of an air conditioner is all she hears when she wakes up. Glancing out the window, she sees that it's still dark out, that the pinks and oranges that herald the sun's return have yet to appear above the horizon. Her first chance to sleep in days, and it lasted a good hour. Her back and left side ache from the fall, and so she lies on her stomach, taps her fingertips against the hardwood floor.

There's a crack of thunder, and she starts, curses, gets to shaky feet and pads over to the door. Her soar body protests as she stumbles down the hall, ordering her to go back and lie down, but she doesn't listen.

The barren hallways are only lit in patches by flickering fluorescent bulbs dangling from the ceiling. All of the doors she passes are closed, and she starts to wonder if she's going to lose herself within this labyrinth of grey and black and nothing.

She reaches into her pocket, fingers the pendant, drops it, bends down, cries out as a stabbing pain shoots through the base of her spine. Down on one knee, she fumbles for the pendant, puts it back into her pocket, rises and leans against the wall.

It passes like a bad wave of nausea, but she doesn't know how much further she can walk. The bottoms of her feet are bruised and cut from the constant walking and running as it is, and she sees a few drops of blood on the tile where she almost fell.

Hoping that they're be somewhere to rest up ahead, she continues onward, turns another bend, finds herself in a kitchen. Pots and pans are scattered about on the countertops, a dirty table is pressed up against the wall in one corner, and stacks of paper join microscopes in the middle of the floor. It looks like a headquarters within a headquarters.

Ellie sits down amidst the papers and rubs her feet. Her burning eyes scan the documents, but none of it means anything to her. She sighs, grabs a microscope, looks into it.

"That's yours."

She almost drops the device, turns around, feels another stab of pain. "Dammit," she groans.

Marlene shakes her head, sits beside the girl. "Lie down."

"What?"

"Lie down. On your stomach."

"Marle-"

"You want me to fix your back or not?"

She scoffs, does as she's told, again drums her fingertips against the floor. Her mouth falls open when she feels calloused hands pressing down on the base of her spine, turning the agony into a dull throb. "Oh my God."

"You never had this done, I assume?"

The hands move up, and Ellie forgets she's lying on the ground in the middle of a room that could, if it weren't for the counters, pots, pans, and oven, pass for a subbasement. "No, and I don't know how that's possible. This is fucking awesome."

Marlene chuckles. "Mouth like your mother's."

"Really?"

"Maybe a little worse."

The girl closes her eyes, moans into the tile. "What did you mean it's mine?"

"Your blood." The Firefly reaches over and taps the slide in the microscope.

"Why are your people looking at it? It's blood."

She chuckles again. "Have you forgotten that you're immune? Most people would be fixated on that."

"I'm fixated on a lot of shit."

"Like?"

Ellie growls, pushes the woman away, slowly gets onto her hands and knees and crawls over to a counter to lean on. "None of your business."

Marlene frowns. "I beg to differ."

"Okay, look, you're not my friend. I came here because I had nowhere else to go. If I had the choice, we wouldn't be sitting her right now."

"What did I do?" the Firefly asks, picking at one of her nails.

"Riley's death is as much your fault as mine."

"I don't see it."

Feeling like she's going to explode, the girl throws her hands into the air, knocks a pan onto the floor. "You were gonna make her leave Boston, so we stayed out longer than we should have, went into that stupid electronics store, pissed of the infected, and now she's fucking dead."

"You done?"

"Am I done?"

"Yes. I'm sorry that you lost her, but you're letting your emotions cloud your judgement." The woman stands, picks up the pan, puts it back in place.

"For the last goddamn time, she was your loss too."

"Not in the same way."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

Marlene turns, raises her eyebrows, puts her hands on her hips. "I saw what there was between you two."

Ellie's cheeks are on fire, and she tries to get back to her feet, but it's a slow and painful process.

"Where are you goin, Speed Racer?"

"Back to bed. I feel terrible."

"You can make things right, you know."

The girl stops in the doorway and blows a loose strand of auburn hair out of her face. "How?"

"Like I said, you're immune."

"And?"

"Come back over here and sit down. We need to have a chat."

The pendant is especially heavy today.

Ellie stares down at the cracked pavement of the highway, follows the double yellow line in the middle that she doesn't understand, listens to Joel rattle on about strumming his guitar or something. Her head hurts, and she thinks she's coming down with a cold, never mind that it's got to be a billion degrees out.

A seemingly endless string of abandoned, fungus consumed cars stretches into the distance, and a few bodies are sprawled across the ground, empty eye sockets staring into the sun like it will save them, bring them back to life.

She stumbles, recovers, glances to her left, sees a deer carved into a wall peppered with bullet holes. Her eyes narrow, she tries to figure out why she finds the deer so interesting, and then it hits her like a sack filled with bricks.

Deer.

How are you still alive?

You have no idea what I'm capable of.

Tiny pieces?

She feels her mind melting, turning to a gloppy soup inside her skull, one that oozes out of her ears and pools at her feet. There is no escape, no escape from all the mistakes.

Why did she follow that deer? Why did she follow him? Why did she trust him? Why didn't she kill him when she had the chance? And she had a million chances; he wouldn't have seen it coming, wouldn't have been able to stop the bullet, wouldn't have been able to chase her to that restaurant, pin her down, come within seconds of turning her into his pet.

So many what-ifs, questions without answers.

What if? What if? What if she hadn't gone out that night?

She remembers the way she almost slammed the door in Riley's face and went back to sleep. She remembers the way she almost turned back in the arcade. She remembers it all, second by second, breath by breath.

She remembers the way she and Riley sat down by the carousel. She remembers the way they put the gun between them. She remembers the way Riley started coughing, started spitting up blood, starting shaking, started turning a shade of dark green.

She remembers how they fell asleep, how they woke up, how Riley lunged at her, how the gun came up, how it was the only way, how that gun was so heavy, so heavy, and the trigger was so hard to pull, and then her ears were ringing and the gun was so light, so light.

If that night hadn't happened, if she had stayed inside, went back to bed, woke up the next morning, then she'd be a military grunt, a drone in the hive, and Riley would still be alive, saving the world with Marlene.

Joel and Tess would still be partners, Henry and Sam would still be brothers, David and James would still be kicking their feet up at the lakeside resort, waiting for little rabbits to wander into their trap.

"Ellie?"

The girl jumps, turns around.

"Did you hear me?" Joel asks.

"No."

No.

No, she didn't.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Sorry for the delay. It's been a busy week, and it took a while to get all of my thoughts for this chapter down. Again, this is the first part of the post-spring segment of the story, which will be my take on what happens to Joel and Ellie following the climactic confrontation with the Fireflies. If you can, drop a review, and, until next time, have a good one. **

**"Whether it's too minutes . . . or two days . . . we don't give that up." - Riley to Ellie after they are bitten**

Chapter 5: Every Second

Marlene steps out of the shadows, a gun in her hand, a look that can only be described as a cross between terror, hope, and sadness in her eyes. She's sure not to point the gun directly at his head, only at his chest.

Potentially non-lethal.

Joel doesn't flinch, doesn't step back, stares her down.

"Even if you get her out of here, then what?" She thinks she's stumping him, derailing him, successfully appealing to the warmth of his heart. Misguided.

He shifts the meager weight in his arms, pulls a pistol out of the back of his jeans.

She doesn't seem to care, comes closer. "How long before she's torn to pieces by a pack of Clickers? That is if she hasn't been raped and murdered first."

"That's not for you to decide."

"It's what she'd want." Her voice cracks, and he narrows his eyes, looking for real emotion, looking for a show, looking for a hint as to who this woman really is.

Ellie's head bumps against his chest, her mouth hangs open, her soft and even breathing whistles through her nose, her freckled cheeks glisten in the pale and flickering lights. Her anxiety, her depression, her guilt are impossible to ignore, and they've left their mark, chewed her up inside, left her raw.

"And you know it."

His head snaps back up, he tightens his grip on the girl's tiny frame, tightens his grip on the gun.

"Look." As she takes another step closer, another step closer to his baby girl, she raises her hands above her head. "You can still do the right thing here. She won't feel anything."

Licking his lips, trying to focus, he feels his heart rate slow, feels himself choosing the path forward without knowing what it is.

Marlene keeps coming, but she's smiling now, smiling at him, smiling at his unconscious daughter.

He can't take the risk. Sarah felt it, she felt her life leak through a hole in her stomach, felt herself take her last breath. Who is this woman to say that Ellie won't feel the knife go in, won't feel her brain sliced and her heart stop? He can't take the risk.

One step too close.

A gunshot rings out.

Queen Firefly stumbles backwards, blood spurting from her side, making a sound halfway between a sob and a scream before falling to the ground. Her gun clatters to the floor beside her, spins off into the darkness of the parking garage.

He stares at the blood, watches the smoke drift into the air from the barrel of the gun. It feels lighter without that bullet weighing it down. It's a bullet that should have been fired twenty-one years ago.

Footsteps echo throughout the cavernous chamber as he finds a car with the keys still in the ignition. A door opens, he gently eases Ellie down in the back seat, slams the door closed.

There's no half way with this.

Queen Firefly is trying to drag herself out of the widening pool of blood. "Wait!" she begs when he again fingers the trigger.

Part of him wants to wait, part of him doesn't. Most of him doesn't. This is his chance to make it right, to make up for what he was too incompetent to manage the first time.

"Let me go. Please." Her eyes search him, probe him, violate him.

"You'd just come after her." He raises the pistol, aims it at her head.

Pulls the trigger.

"Ellie? Ellie? Wake up." Riley is standing by her friend's bed, head cocked to the side, lips curled into a mischievous grin. She pulls back the curtains, whistles when she sees the rain hammering against the glass and the wind shaking the windowpane.

"What are you doing here?" Ellie mumbles groggily, rolling onto her side and trying to fall back asleep.

"Uh, did you forget what today is? Really? I'm not the one who is supposed to remember _your _birthday. Happy fourteenth!"

Ellie wants to be mad, but she smiles, slowly sits up, props her back against the headboard. "Thanks. You didn't need to risk it; Fireflies aren't allowed in Boston, in case you forgot."

Riley scoffs. "I'm not gonna get held up by military dipshits. You ready to go?"

The younger girl's mouth falls slightly open. "Go where?"

"Home. I'm taking us home."

She's surrounded by darkness, impenetrable darkness, but she can feel the ground beneath her rising and falling like it's breathing. Her legs and arms are bare; she can feel the cool air tickling them. Eyes open, not her bunk at the boarding school.

A car.

Her head feels heavy. In fact, her entire body feels heavy, and it's stiff and soar like she was body slammed or something. Groaning softly, she runs her fingertips over what looked like a hospital gown. "What the Hell am I wearing?"

Joel, in the front seat, sweaty, tired. "Take it easy. Drugs are still wearing off."

Drugs? She raises her head, feels sick almost immediately, rubs her eye. The rushing water comes back to her, the rushing water that filled her eyes, her nose, her throat, sucked the life out of her, threw her against the rocks again and again. "What happened?"

He sighs, adjusts his grip on the wheel, looks in the rearview mirror. "We found the Fireflies. Turns out there's a . . . whole lot more like you, Ellie. People that are immune. It's dozens, actually."

A thousand questions form on her lips, but she can't spit them out. She's frozen like she was during the winter, shivering as ice forms on her ankles, knees, waist, hands, arms, head.

"Aint' done a damn bit of good neither. They've actually st-" He inhales deeply.

She gulps.

"They've stopped looking for a cure."

Her heart skips a beat, her hand fumbles for her pocket to find Riley's pendant. She closes her eyes, rolls onto her side, facing away from him. It's impossible to breathe, it's impossible to see. She's failed. She's a failure. She's a complete failure, an idiot, a loser, someone who doesn't deserve to live, deserve to be happy. People died for her, Riley died for her.

"I'm taking us home," Joel says. "I'm sorry."

Ellie wants her switchblade, she wants it now. She wants to see blood.

It hits him as he drives through a suburb at dusk: Their food and extra clothes were lost in the tunnels. Sighing, he parks at the curb outside of a reasonably intact ranch house, looks in the rear view mirror.

She's asleep, her brow doused in sweat, her cheeks beat red.

"Ah, shit." Carrying her near-weightless form in his arms for the second time that day, he presses his forehead to hers, faintly smiles when he finds it's cool. Nightmares, probably, nightmares yet again.

Nearly barren living room, devoid even of overturned and broken furniture. Somebody was here; the doors to the other parts of the house are boarded up, the window blinds are drawn, and there are three mattresses in front of a mark in the carpet left by a TV stand.

He gently puts her down on one, looks about for a blanket. The temperature has dropped more than he would have expected, and she's only wearing a hospital gown that barely comes down to her knees.

Nothing underneath the other mattresses, nothing in a closet, nothing in the living room at all. Joel hurries back outside, casting a worried glance over his shoulder like somebody will come out of the darkness and snatch her away when he's not looking.

Into another house. His knuckle turns white as he tightens his grip on his magnum, climbs the stairs to the second floor, scuffs his shoes against a badly torn and stale-smelling carpet. Empty picture frames dangle at odd angles from screws in the wall, but this place is nearly barren too. Whoever cleaned this place out was painstakingly thorough, and he finds himself affected by a tiny bit of admiration. There's a torn blanket on the ground in what was probably a bedroom, but it's all he's got, so he goes back to the neighbor's.

Ellie is sitting up in bed,, knees hugged to her chest, rocking back and forth, her eyes again glassed over. She flinches when she hears the door open and flinches again when she hears it close.

"Baby?" He kneels down beside her, tries to look into her big green eyes, but she keeps burying her face in the thin cloth of the gown.

She pulls away at his touch, shakes her head furiously like he's asked her a question that repulses her.

"What's wrong? Talk to me, El, what's wrong?"

Her voice cracks, but she's not trying to talk; she's crying. After a few seconds, she stops trying to disguise it, starts wailing, starts breathing so rapidly and violently that it sounds like she's hyperventilating.

It scares him, and he puts the blanket to the side, tries to hold her hand. It's slick with sweat, but she doesn't pull away this time, lets her boney fingers lie limply across his palm like they've died. "Hey, hey, talk to me. Please."

She looks up, but not at him, makes a choking sound. Her face is so red that it looks like she's having an allergic reaction. The wails turn back into quiet sobs; the storm ends as suddenly as it came.

"There we go. You good?"

"Where were you?" she rasps, eyes the blanket.

He follows her gaze, drapes it around her shoulders, winces when he sees bruises through the fabric speckling her back. The current in the tunnels was strong; it must have dashed her against the rocks, and the Fireflies hadn't bothered to bandage her up. "You in pain?"

"Where were you?" she demands, louder this time.

"Next door. Looking for something to keep you warm."

A shudder shakes her from head to toe. "Thought you were gone, maybe you decided to drop me off after all."

That stings. "Why would I do that?"

"I wouldn't want to worry about me either. Too weak." She starts crying again, puts her hand to her hip, straightens her back, looks about frantically.

"What?"

"Where is it? Where are my cargo pants? Where's my back pack?" Before he can stop her, she's on her feet, hurrying around the room, pulling on loose strands of her hair.

Joel tries to get in front of her, is brushed aside. "What are you looking for?"

"I had a pendant, and it's gone. Where is it? Where's my switchblade? Where's my fucking shit?" She opens the front door, tugs the blanket tighter around her body, runs to the car on wobbly legs. Sleep is taking over again, he can see it in her clumsy movements, and she's trying to fight a losing battle.

"I found your backpack in the hospital. That's all I found."

She opens the trunk, unzips her pack, sighs with relief.

He looks up at the waning moon, thinks for a second that he's alone, looks over at her to make sure she's still real. It's a strange feeling, one he can't explain, one he can't fully dispel. "Grab your stuff, come back inside. I want you to get some rest."

"I'm fine."

A deep breath. "Let's not go through this again. Please?"

Ellie cradles her backpack to her chest, sniffles, saunters back into the living room, sits down on the mattress and rests her head against the pack like its a pillow. This isn't her. The bags underneath her eyes are so deep, her eyes are so bloodshot, and her demeanor is so warped that he figures she's suffering from emotional and physical exhaustion. At least, he hopes that he's right.

He pulls another mattress over so that it's pressed up against hers, lies down, has her do the same.

For a few seconds, she looks at him like he's insane, but she slowly puts down her pack, lies down on her side, inches closer until he puts his arms around her and gently pulls her against his chest.

It doesn't take long for her to fall back asleep, but he doesn't want to risk it. He's paranoid about being followed, even though he knows that nobody from the hospital could possibly have any idea where he went. Anyone who did is dead.

Whatever was wrong with her there, whatever near delusional episode overtook her, it reminds him of when she was sick during the winter. That, this was how he was, and that lasted for months. How did she survive on her own? How much of her cracks are from being attacked by that monster, how many are from the Fireflies, and how many are from just being alone?

Dawn comes, and he can't remember if he actually got any sleep. It doesn't matter; he's wide awake, not even remotely troubled by the need to rest.

She shifts in his arms, her eyes open, and she looks up at him like a lost puppy.

"Mornin," he whispers, tucking a few strands of auburn hair behind her ear.

"Hi."

"How you doin?"

Her legs crack as she stretches them out, but she immediately puts her hand to her forehead when she sits up. "Woah, head rush."

His grip on her shoulders tightens.

"Relax, Joel. It's only a headache. And I guess my back hurts too." Her fingers prod the base of her spine, and she grimaces.

"Yeah."

"Before you say anything about it, I want to apologize for last night. I wasn't thinking." She stands, looks down at the hospital gown, scowls.

"You were tired."

She closes her eyes, nods. "So tired. Do you mind if I take a nap in the car?"

"Not at all. Since we're not walking, it should only take a few days to get back to Wyoming."

"Good. Then let's go." She grabs her pack, slings it over one shoulder, apparently ignoring the pain in her back, and opens the front door, shielding her eyes from the sun.

"El," he calls. "You don't want breakfast?"

"Nah. What I want is some real clothes." There's no smile with words he feels should sound cheery, there's no real emotion. She sounds wooden, automatic, fake, and yet her eyes aren't glassed over right now.

Her silhouette framed by the light pouring through the door.

Not Ellie Williams.

Somebody else.

The smell of smoke wakes her up. Her head is still killing her, her back aches, and she feels like she hasn't slept in years, but she lifts her head off of the pillow Joel put in the back seat and looks through the car window.

He's sitting on the top of a hill, a small fire beside him, staring out at the distant forest and what might be a neighborhood nestled within. There's an oddly shaped stick poking out of the ground, and he runs his fingertips over it every now and again.

She yawns and scratches her side, wishing she had a real bed to sleep on. The door opens, she steps out into the twilight, squints as the setting sun turns the sky into a yellow, orange, and pick patchwork quilt. Her hair falls limply down around her shoulders without her hairband, but she doesn't much care about how she looks. Right now, she doesn't feel anything, and maybe that's not a bad thing.

Joel looks up at her when she walks towards him, holds out his hand. "You sleep well?"

She takes his hand, sits down beside him, leans her pounding head against his shoulder. "Considering."

His body is rigid, and he seems unnerved by her closeness. "You see those houses out there?"

A sleepy nod.

"I used to live there. Twenty-one years ago."

She pulls back, stares at him. It's taking her distressed brain a while to catch up with what he's said, and so she gapes at him instead of saying something. What she wants to say, she doesn't know. What she should say, she doesn't know. A cool breeze rolls through, and her poorly covered body is covered in goosebumps. She holds her hands over the small fire, ignores the dangers of lighting it.

"Thought about visitin," he continues. "Maybe I'm a coward, but I couldn't do it. Too many ghosts."

Ellie stares into the flames, takes a deep breath, hugs her knees to her chest. She wants to lie down on this hill, allow the tall blades of brown grass to tickle her feet and hands and face. She wants to lie here forever, forget about who she is, where she's supposed to be going, all the people she's gotten killed. The worst part is that there's no remorse, there hasn't been any remorse since the hospital, and yet she knows he's lying to her and that she's not doing anything to learn the truth.

"I miss you," he whispers.

She doesn't understand; she's right next to him. Maybe she is confused, maybe she is a bit lost, but she's not gone, not yet, not fully. At least, she doesn't think she is. Glancing over her shoulder, she realizes that it's not a stick that he's stroking.

He sees that she sees, and he smiles. "I needed to move her somewhere safe, somewhere beautiful, somewhere she'd be able to see the whole neighborhood. You can't deny this view."

"No," she mumbles. "You can't."

"Come here. I want you to meet her; it's 'bout time." Again, he holds out his hand, the hand with the watch.

There's still nothing, no sadness, no anticipation, no nothing, but she takes his hand, allows him to gently pull her towards the grave.

Joel leans back on his elbows.

Her fingers rest atop the makeshift cross. "What do you want me to say?"

"You don't have to say anything. We were in the area, and I haven't dropped by in a long time. She gives me peace, and I thought she might give you some too."

The redhead chews on the inside of her cheek. She doesn't understand how this could give him peace; if she had buried Riley, the grave wouldn't give her any peace. If she went back to Henry and Sam's graves, it would only scare her. If she found Tess's corpse, probably torn apart by clickers, she would feel physically ill. But he gets peace here?

Ellie tightens her grip on the cross. How would she get peace from coming? She didn't know this girl. This girl is the reason that he treated her like shit for the first several months of their relationship. This girl is the reason he didn't care about her. This girl is the reason that . . .

"Hi, Sarah," she says, tucking a few strands of sweaty auburn hair behind her ear.

Joel's eyes are closed.

A faint smile touches her lips, and she leans closer. "Thank you."

She lets go.

And all the emotion comes back. She killed Riley. She killed Tess. She killed Henry and Sam. She killed all those people in David's camp who had wives and children, forced them to leave a place that they felt was safe. And now, she feels like she's lost a sister.

Maybe she has.

The sun sets.

And the two of them move on, leaving the third point of the triangle behind.

He's bent over the hood of the car, coughing as a cloud of steam forms around his head. Stepping back and throwing a small wrench to the ground, he walks over to the driver's side door, where she's perched, and rubs the skin on his wrist above his watch. "Well, look's like we're walking."

She doesn't meet his gaze, only nods, stops touching the scar tissue left behind by that runner, pulls the sleeve of her plaid jacked down. Her soft features are, for a slight second, marred by pain as she straightens her back and hops down to the ground, slamming the car door behind her. The headache is blistering, and she wants to shut her eyes and go back to sleep. So much sleep lately, but it's not doing any good.

He's uneasy, but he jogs over to a small wire fence, flexes his fingers, pulls the pieces apart and grimaces himself as the violent material chews on his palms. "Should be a straight shot through here."

"Alright." Her movements are lethargic, and she imagines she looks stupid with her arms waving limply about her tiny figure.

"Actually kinda pretty, ain't it?" Without trying to be too direct, he nods at the fence, winces again.

"Yeah." She mentally slaps herself for taking too long to get the message, saunters over, slips through the opening.

"Now, watch you head going through."

Ignoring him, she hunches over to grab the wire herself. "Here. Got it."

He mimics her, quickly straightens up, takes a deep breath and looks around at the small grove with its massive trees and short grass speckled only in patches by golden sunlight. Small rocks lie at the base of a mountain, having tumbled from somewhere higher up. An abandoned truck lies nestled against a natural wall, vines slipping through the windows and around the steering wheel. "Feelin' my age now," he says, giving her a forced smile and a pat on the back.

It hurts, but standing up straight again hurts worse, and the sun is intensifying her headache. She presses a hand to her temple, feels like she should punch herself, let it get worse, punish herself for all the things she's failed to do. Because how is this fair? She's going off to live in paradise after what she's done?

She grunts at him so that he doesn't think she's ignored his poor attempt at a joke, follows him towards a rock ledge that probably looks out over Jackson.

"Don't think I ever told you, but Sarah and I used to take hikes like this," he says, pauses. "I think, um, I think the two of you would have been good friends. Think you really woulda liked her. I know she woulda liked you."

"I'm sure I would have." Her voice breaks, she feels another weight press down on her chest, her heart literally burns.

He's standing on the rock ledge, tussling her hair when she joins him. "Wow. Look down there."

Brown houses, overturned cars that have been pushed off of the paved road. Streetlights, front porches, a park with a basketball hoop and a swing set. People milling about, reading in lounge chairs set up near the street, waving at each other, laughing, joking. Guard towers and tall walls, warm and protective unlike the cold and brutal ones of Boston. A home. A paradise.

And she doesn't deserve to be here.

"Just a little bit further now," he assures her, hurrying down towards a small river and climbing up onto another rock ledge with grass that reaches his waist.

She follows slowly, stares at the river for a few moments, watches it trickle over the edge and spill down towards what is probably a small lake near the town. Her eyes are watering, but she doesn't want him to see that, doesn't want to appear even weaker. But that thought only makes her lower lip tremble. A small strangled cry escapes her throat, but her mouth is closed, so she's sure he doesn't hear it.

"Here, I got you." He holds out his hand yet again, beckons for her to join him on the ledge and go back home. But she doesn't deserve a home.

Sauntering up, she braces herself for the pain that is going to shoot through her back as soon as she jumps up.

"Gimme you hand."

She leaps, only barely avoids groaning, lets him do most of the work as he pulls her up.

"Alright, come on." He helps her to her feet, gestures towards Jackson.

Her head seems to be struck by a sledgehammer, and she can't keep quiet anymore. "Hey, wait."

Joel turns around, raises an eyebrow.

She laces her fingers together, lets her hands fall to her sides, turns away, turns back, shakes her head like she's scolding him. "Back in Boston – back when I was bitten – I wasn't alone. My best friend was there. And she got bit too."

His face falls the slightest bit.

Why is she telling him this? What does he care? That was her fault, her fault and her's alone. The weight on her chest feels like it's getting lighter, though, so she doesn't stop. Or is this wrong, trying to move past Riley's death so that she feels better? Does she deserve to feel better? "We didn't know what to do. So, she says, 'Let's just wait it out. Y'know, we can be all poetic and just lose our minds together.' I'm still waiting for my turn."

He steps closer, looks like he's about to hug her. "Ellie-"

"Her name was Riley, and she was the first to die. And then it was Tess. And then Sam." Ellie can fear her face turning red, the tears threatening to spill over and, once again, make her look like a pathetic little girl who can't take care of herself.

"None of that is on you." He crosses his arms, glances over at the town.

"No, you don't understand."

"I struggled for a long time with survivin'. And you, no matter what, you keep finding something to fight for." His fingers brush over the surface of the watch.

The weight on her chest comes back, slams down, nearly knocks the air out of her lungs and the blood out of her heart.

"Now, I know that's not what you want to hear right now, but it's-"

"Swear to me." She stares at him, tries to intimidate him. "Swear to me that everything that you said about the Fireflies is true."

How can she go back to Jackson when she's a failure, when she's failed to do the one thing that she set out to do? Everyone who had to pay with their lives to get her to Utah, and all she did was pass out because she was too weak to finish the job. Weak, too weak, too weak.

He sighs. "I swear."

And she's positive he's lying, positive he's covering for her, for the weak failure. But she wants to go to Jackson, she wants to go there so bad, to live again. And so she's selfish, disgustingly selfish. "Okay."


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Sorry for the long break in between updates. Getting the tone of this chapter right proved a challenge, and I can only hope that it turned out well. I am currently working on another, much larger project, and so it can be hard to find time to write a chapter that I'm happy enough with to post. Hopefully the delay between chapters six and seven won't be quite as long; I know exactly where I want this part of the narrative to go, so that may speed things up. Thanks for the patience, and thanks for reading. Please, if you can, tell me what you think. Have a great weekend! **

**"Everything happens for a reason." - David **

Chapter 6: I'm Not Like You

Soft.

The pillow is soft. The blankets are soft. The mattress is soft. The pajamas – the sweat pants and long-sleeve pink shirt – are soft. The room is soft, the house is soft, Jackson is soft. And the outside is hard and rough and jagged.

She lies on her back, stares up at the ceiling, traces a small crack with her eyes that runs from one corner of the room to another, forming a diagonal line. Her left hand is closed protectively around the pendant. The scent of dirt and sweat and blood no longer pervades her skin, even though she feels like it should, and her hair, damp from the shower, sticks to her neck and brow. She had a real dinner, not something from a can or from the military's rations officers. She's full, maybe too full, and she yawns, arches her back, sits up and puts the pendant on the tired and beaten nightstand beside the bed.

This is all new, different, oddly disconcerting. She's been getting weird looks all day; people don't like that she's not cheering, not smiling, not ready to get down on her knees and thank God that she's somewhere safe. But they don't understand why.

Maria and Tommy are worried about her; they kept staring at her during dinner, kept trying to force her into the conversation with questions about how she's doing, how she's been holding up. It wasn't like they were going to succeed; Joel kept his mouth shut about the hospital, and Ellie certainly wasn't going to bring up winter. So, really, what was she going to talk about besides guilt? Idiocy? Weakness? Failure?

She can hear them talking downstairs. What is Joel going to say to keep their curiosity in check? His plan was to come here, come back to his family, and then lie to them about everything? Why can't he tell the truth? If those two really care about him, they won't hate him for whatever it is that he's done and is too ashamed to admit.

"No, it's not like that," Tommy is saying.

"Pfft." She could easily creep down the tiny staircase that leads into the living room, eavesdrop, but she doesn't want to. Any more memories or what-ifs about Utah will make her explode, and she'd like to get at least one good night's sleep in before she goes. Her comics are scattered across the sheets beside her, but she's already read them. Maybe there's a library here that she can spend her days in, shut away from the people she never wants to be around, the ones she could have helped get back to whatever a normal life is if she'd only made the cure.

Sighing, she puts a hand to her aching stomach, gingerly pokes and prods it with her fingers. For some reason, it's comforting, but it doesn't make the pain go away. Without understanding why, she stands, goes over to the window, looks out over the town with its cracked roads, guard towers, walls, patched up houses bathed in light from street lamps and lanterns hanging from front porches.

There's a girl sitting beneath one of the street lamps, hugging her knees to her chest, reading a book. Dirty blonde hair pulled back into bangs, fair skin, relatively short stature. Ellie always imagined that that's what her young mother would have looked like, even though it's more than a little unlikely since Marlene said she was a redhead.

The girl rises, stares up at the sky, points at the stars and the moon like she's trying to tell somebody something. A soft breeze blows her bangs in front of her face, and she shakes her head from side to side to put them back in place. She turns, stops, stares at Ellie through the window.

Neither one of the moves a muscle or turns away. They're unwilling to break whatever it is that they've so spontaneously formed. It's delicate, fragile, and the mere act of slouching or taking a deep breath might be enough to knock it to the ground.

Footsteps on the stairs. The spell is broken; Ellie turns around in surprise, curses, returns to the window, and the girl on the street is gone. "Dammit," the redhead groans, pressing her hands against the glass and pressing her forehead to the wall.

"El? Can I come in?" Joel.

"Yeah." She returns to her place on the bed, flops down onto her back, wraps herself up in a blanket.

He doesn't look normal without any plaid, but the white t-shirt suits him well enough, she supposes. "I'm sorry about that. I know they were makin' you uncomfortable."

She curls up into a ball to try and soothe the pain in her belly, buries her face in the pillow. "Whatever. What did you tell them? They're gonna want to know about Utah."

"Don' worry. I told them what I told you; I told them the truth."

A shiver runs up her spine. Truth.

"And I told them that it bummed ya out, that you've been dealin with some heavy stuff for the past few months. That ain't a lie, now is it?" He sits down on the bed beside her, scratches her back.

She can't stop a sound akin to a purr from escaping her lips, but she tries to cover it with a cough. "Whatever."

"Whatever," he whispers, sounding more than a little irked. "Are ya sure you don't want your own place? They can set somethin' up for one of us in the room next to theirs."

"No." Ellie sits up, wears the blanket like a robe, pads over to the door.

"Where are ya goin?" He rubs the face of his watch; he's nervous. Why shouldn't he be? Liars can't expect to live perfect little lives after the deed is done, no matter how damning that deed was.

She leans against the doorframe. "I'm going to say goodnight to Tommy and Maria, then I'm turning in."

"Only about nine."

Why is he so persistent? "I'm tired, I'm having a bit of a culture shock, and I feel like I swallowed a cactus; I'm going to sleep."

That seems to shut him up; he looks down at his bare feet, waves her on.

Maybe she should get her own room.

The stairs creak beneath her, and the railing groans as she leans on it. Her lips curl upwards slightly when she sees the small kitchen, the equally tiny dining room, the living room with its beaten couch, rocking chair, television propped up on a crate covered in cloth, fireplace with pictures on the mantle that she hasn't yet looked hard at. Maybe she's never had a home, but she can't help but feel that this could, should be it.

If only she deserved it.

Tommy is sprawled across the couch, Maria is sitting on the floor with her back up against the wall.

"Guys," Ellie mumbles, knocking her knuckle against the doorframe.

"Hey, Kid," Tommy cheers, waving her over. "What's up?"

She smiles sheepishly, saunters over, gives him a high five when he prompts her for one. "I'm going to hit the sack. Just wanted to say thanks, I guess. For everything. Nobody's offered me a place to stay before, not anything permanent."

"It's high time someone did." Maria pulls the girl into a bear hug.

Why? What makes her so special after all the mistakes she's made? Nobody she's known, with the exception of David, has ever made more. But she doesn't say that. "Thanks."

"You can stop saying that."

"Okay."

She pulls away as soon as the wrapped around her loosen their grip, straightens her hair, nods in both of their respective directions. "Night."

"Night, Ellie," they say in unison.

Halfway up the stairs, she stops, wipes he nose, represses the sudden urge to break down and scream, goes into the bathroom, splashes some cold water on her face, returns to her room, blows Joel off when he tries to talk to her, lies down, curls up, and pretends to be asleep.

He must stay awake for a while because she can see the light from a lamp through her eyelids. When it finally goes out, she hears the bed frame squeak, and she knows that she won't have to wait too much longer.

When she can hear even breathing, she slips out from beneath the covers, hurries back downstairs, out the front door, through the twisting and winding streets, to the front gate that let her into paradise-earthed.

Two guards have their backs turned to her, flashlights and rifles pointed into the darkness.

"Alright, two guards." She turns back, finds that streetlamp that the girl was sitting under, and leans against the pole, staring up at the sky until the sun begins to rise, and she has to hurry back to avoid scaring her newfound caretakers.

She didn't find anything worse watching in the sky, but now she knows that there are only two guards in the middle of the night. Should the need arise, she'd be able to slip by them easy.

Breakfast isn't remotely appealing to her; her stomach still hurts, and the idea of food makes her feel like she's going to puke. She sits on the couch while the adults chat over eggs from a chicken farm run by some guy named Dale, fingers the pendant, reads a comic for the third time.

"You sure you aren't hungry?" Maria calls.

"No, thank you."

"Ain't she polite?" Tommy whispers. "Please and thank you and all that shit."

Joel laughs. "Most of the time it's just 'and all that shit.'"

Ellie scowls. "Fucker."

Tommy decides to take his brother on a tour, and the girl thinks she's managed to get everyone out of her hair by saying she's not up to it until Maria says she'll stay home too. Back peddling, tucking a few locks of auburn hair behind her ear, she puts on a fake smile, tilts her head to the side. "Can I check out the town by myself?"

"It can be kinda confusing, finding your way around here," Tommy replies, exchanging a weary glance with his wife.

"I can do it, and I'll ask somebody for help if I get lost. Nobody's trying to kill me here, so what's the harm?"

Joel looks away at what the redhead realizes was a morbid joke, considering.

She clasps her hands behind her back, smiles wider. "Please? I'm responsible."

Nobody responds.

Sighing, she slips her hands into her pockets. "Guys, I'm not trying to avoid you, but I need some time alone. 'Kay?"

Still nothing.

She brushes past Joel, opens the front door, starts walking down the street, mumbling a string of curses to herself, and then cursing because she probably made them more suspicious. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

"Stop," a gravely voice commands, and she can hear footsteps fast approaching. A calloused hand grips her shoulder, forces her to look at him.

"What?"she spits, trying to keep her voice low to avoid making all the passerby think she's even weirder.

"Can ya stop running away from them?"

"How did you explain that I'm dealing with heavy stuff? Cause I'm starting to think you made me sound like I'm ready to shoot myself in the head as soon as I'm alone. I have said it a million times before, and I'll say it again. I'm. Fine." She jabs herself in the chest with her finger, draws out each word.

He rolls his eyes. "People aren't blind. They care about you, and they see that somethin ain't right. In case ya forgot, they did meet you before ya turned all quiet and moody."

"Moody?"

"Yeah. And you can lie to me about how fine you are as much as you want, but it won't chance what I know."

"You guys aren't my family, so just leave me the fuck alone. Please and thank you and all that shit." She shakes his hand off of her shoulder, stalks off. Her mind is racing a million miles an hour, she can feel eyes on her again, and she wants to dig herself a hole, crawl into it, and go to sleep for a couple of years.

Someone pours water on the coals; anger turns to all-familiar guilt, and she finds herself sitting by that same streetlamp, gently banging her forehead against the pole. Why did she say that? That was so close to being untrue, a blatant lie, at least for Joel, that she doesn't understand where it even came from. Maybe it was only a random desire to hurt, like the one he had back at the Ranch House in the fall.

And if what she says was so close to a lie, if he really is almost family, then what does that make Tommy and Maria? What does that even make Joel? Is he a father, or a really close friend?

"You're gonna give yourself a concussion," a soft voice chirps, and she almost expects her hallucination of Riley to be standing behind her.

She groans and immediately straightens her back, stops banging her head against a pole like an idiot.

The girl with the dirty blonde bangs is standing about a foot away, a book in the crook of her right arm, a glass of water in her left hand. She is short; probably only four foot eleven, but she has the face of somebody about Riley's age. Grey eyes, rosy cheeks. The girl is welcoming, even though she's looking at the redhead like she's a loon.

Join the club.

"Sorry, I was being a dope," Ellie says, standing up, brushing herself off, looking down at herself and blushing because she's only now realizing she never changed out of her pajamas. Why that's making her blush, she's not quite sure.

"That's fine," the girl laughs. "But, ya know, don't give yourself a skull fracture. You're new here, right? I think I saw you last night."

"Yeah."

"Samantha," she says, putting down the water and holding out her free hand. "Everyone calls me Sammy."

Sammy. Sam. How long will it take for the two of them to be alike in more than name? Pretending to tuck another stubborn strand of auburn hair away, she pinches herself on the ear to pull herself out of that weird and depressing train of thought, takes Sammy's hand. "Ellie."

"So, what are you doing trying to steal my favorite spot?" Putting on a mock frown, the blonde plops down, leans her back up against the streetlamp.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"I'm kidding. You are more than welcome to join me."

Ellie scratches the back of her neck, wrings her hands together, tries to think. Should she? Or should she go back home and jump the fissure she opened up in three relationships at the same time?

Sammy crosses her legs. "Hey, do you want a tour?"

"Nah, you were going to read. You do that."

"Well, have you seen the town?"

"No, but I can find my way around."

"Come on," she says, hopping to her feet, taking the redhead's hand.

Her heart skips a few beats, and she feels butterflies in her stomach instead of an ache. What is wrong with her? "I don't want to impose."

The blonde laughs again. "I'm offering, so you can't impose. You look like you could use a little fun."

Ellie sighs, wishes again for no real reason that she'd changed before she left. "Okay."

"Good," Sammy says, starting off down a small alleyway. "I need to drop my book off back at my place and get you a jacket."

"Why?"

"It's gonna rain today."

"How do you know?"

"I can feel it." She turns around, talks as she walks backwards. "My dad is the same way. Now, your dad is, let me think, Joel, right? I heard the name thrown around; guess he's related to Tommy and Maria."

Ellie nods, debating wether or not she should mention that she isn't biologically related to any of them. She wasn't related to Riley, though, and that certainly ended up being rather intimate.

"Here we are," Sammy says in a sing-song voice, skips up the steps to a small one-story house, opens the front door. "Come on in, make yourself at home."

Is this what people were like before the outbreak? No, there's no way. People would be getting shot and robbed and beaten left and right. Slowly, again wringing her hands together, the redhead steps onto the welcome mat in the foyer, smiles at the wall nearly blocked by old and tattered books. "Wow."

"Yeah, that's my collection. Years in the making," the blonde says, clasping her hands over her heart and wiping at a fake tear. "This jacket might be a little small for you, but it'll do."

Floorboards squeak as she opens a closet, snatches a brown leather coat, hands it to her companion and tosses the book she's holding on top of the stack.

Though she can't help but feel like a bit of a moocher, Ellie is glad to at least make it look like she got half-dressed. "Thanks, Samantha."

"Sammy."

"Sammy."

They laugh, though the blonde is clearly much more at ease. "Okay, come on, I want to show you the main square."

The conversation is almost completely one sided as the duo strolls through the streets. Sammy has more thoughts inside her little head than Ellie ever though imaginable, and there' s so much emotion, so much vitality in her every step that the redhead starts to forget what was bugging her this morning.

Soon enough, the sky is overcast, and both girls pull up their hoods before running to cover inside of a barn on the outskirts of town. "So," the chatterbox drawls out as soon as the door is closed and the chickens milling about inside their pens take notice of the visitors, "what do you think?"

Ellie finds herself giggling, something she doesn't think she's done in years. Not since that night. "It was pretty cool. I guess I could get used to living here."

"Everybody does." Sammy sits down on a bale of hay, flips a bang over her shoulder.

Thunder rumbles in the distance, a flash of lightning illuminates the barn in a dark blue glow.

"Everybody, huh?"

"Yeah. Look, I know it's weird at first, but this is how people are meant to live. All you get living out there is stress, and stress is bad for you. Trust me." For the slightest second, there's an immense amount of pain in her eyes, so much pain that it seems like she'll break apart if anybody so much as breaths on her. But then it's gone, and the smile comes back.

The other girl frowns, leans against the wall, feels the ache in her belly return at the same time that the next burst of thunder roles over Jackson. "Do you think that everyone who's here deserves to be here?"

That smile wavers again. "That's a weird question. What do you mean?"

"Is it possible for somebody who's done bad things to end up here? Safe? Happy?"

Sammy looks from left to right. "I don't see anybody like that around here? Do you?"

"You didn't answer my question."

She slowly gets to her feet. "Are you talking about yourself?"

No response, despite the strong urge to nod.

"Oh, please," she whispers, barley audible over the storm. "You aren't a bad person."

Ellie can't stop herself: "I've killed people. A lot of people."

"So have I."

What? That doesn't seem possible. But what if she looked in the mirror. Would she think herself capable of murder? Is it even murder, or is it survival? Is it surviving, as Joel would put it. "I killed my best friend."

"Why?"

"Because she was infected."

"Then you didn't kill her."

Her hand hovers over her sleeve, fingers yearning to yank it up and reveal the scar, the bite mark, the immunity that has saved her life so many times by sacrificing somebody else's. She grips her forearm so tightly that her knuckle turns white, the blood stops circulating, the pain draws tears to her eyes that she won't allow to fall. "You don't know me, and that's the way it should stay."

Sammy doesn't move for a few seconds, each of which feels like an eternity. She licks her lips, looks away. "Come on, I'll walk you home."

"No!" The redhead steps back, shakes her head furiously, remembers what happened when Riley wanted to walk her home. She's only met this kid, they're inside Jackson, and yet she's sure she'll find a way to get her killed.

"Bu-"

"No, no, no. This was a mistake; I never should have followed you. Trust me, Sammy, you don't want to be anywhere near me. I'm dangerous."

"I don't believe that."

The tears are spilling over now, and Ellie doesn't know how to stop them. "I'm a monster."

"Should I find my dad? Yours?"

"No, don't, I don't want anybody to come near me."

"Ellie, stop."

"But I'll only hurt them."

"Stop."

"I can't. Don't you think I want to?"

"You're bleeding."

She licks the space below her nose, tastes red.

"I'm gonna get my dad."

Before she can respond, Sammy is out the door, running down the street back towards her tiny little house with all its old books, all its peace, all its tranquility.

Everything that a monster can never have.

"Fuck!" Ellie screeches, kicks an empty bucket across the length of the barn, finally pulls up her sleeve and stares at the bite mark. "Why does this fucking scar have to ruin everything?"

Another burst of thunder, another flash of lightning.

She reaches into her sweatpants pocket, pulls out the switchblade, presses the tip to the discolored flesh. "Oh, who am I kidding?"

The blade knife clatters to the ground, she sits down on the floor, buries her face in her hands. "Why didn't I just stay at the boarding school? Why didn't I go back at the arcade? "

It hits her. The scar isn't the problem. Riley came back to see her, to see her and her alone, and that's what got her killed. It's not the scar, it's something deeper.

"Oh my God."

Ellie looks up.

Sammy stands in the doorway beside a tall man with grey hair and soft eyes, just like his daughter's. But both of their mouths are hanging open.

The redhead follows their gazes.

She never pulled her sleeve back down.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N: Thanks for all of the continuing support for the story, everybody! As I'm sure plenty of you know, it's incredibly encouraging to see that people actually like what you're putting out. At this point, I'm going to say that updates will probably occur about once a week; that seems to be the shortest amount of time in which I can figure out exactly how I want the chapter to go, write it, and make sure that the tone is satisfactory. After all, with something like _The Last of Us_, tone is almost everything. This is especially tricky since I've added Sammy, who has to fit into a world that is so expertly and carefully crafted by Naught Dog that it's kind of baffling. I appreciate the patience! As always, drop a review if you can, and have a great weekend. **

**"I sell hardcore drugs." - Sarah **

Chapter 7: Wishing on a Falling Star

"How many times, Dad?" Sarah sits in the passenger seat, her arms crossed over her chest, her eyes narrowed at the road like it's what's ruined her night. Her cleat taps furiously against the floor, and she shivers, pulls the jacket tighter around her shoulders.

"I'm sorry, Baby. The job ran late."

"But practice ended three hours ago, and it's freezing outside. Did that occur to you?"

"I tried to call Tommy."

"Did he pick up?"

"No."

"Then why didn't you come get me?"

"Because I left him a message and I assumed he'd get it."

She sighs, hops out the door as soon as he pulls the truck into the driveway, grabs her bag from the backseat and hurries inside.

He allows the engine to sit idle for a few minutes before turning it off and leaning back in his chair. His fingers are numb from gripping a cold steering wheel without gloves, deep circles appear like bruises beneath his eyes, and he gets the feeling that he'll be ignored until tomorrow. Or the next day, depending on how long it takes for her to calm down.

Chuckling bitterly, he opens the front door, hears the shower running upstairs, throws together a quick dinner with the salad greens and tofu. He hates salad, but Sarah's turning into a health nut, just like her mother. Hopefully not _just_ like her mother.

It's not like she's in the wrong; the temperature dropped as soon as the sun went down, and she got over a cold less than a week ago.

"Stupid," he whispers, sits down on the couch, turns on the TV and pretends to watch the news.

She bounds downstairs, dressed in slippers, a sweater, and baggy pajama pants. Her hair is still dripping wet, but he decides not to start another argument. The big grey eyes are a little softer when she looks at him, and a ghost of a smile tickles her lips. "Sorry, Dad."

He gapes at her. "You're sorry? For what?"

"Snappin at ya." Her slippers thud against the carpet as she grabs her salad from the kitchen and sits down beside him.

They sit in silence, and he taps his fingers against his brow, trying to figure her out. As sweet as she is, she never admits she's wrong because she only ever snaps when she's confident she's in the right.

It clicks, and he doesn't know how he's missed it. "Why didn't one of your friends give ya a ride home?"

Sarah tenses, spears a piece of tofu and slams it against the side of the bowl. "Don' worry 'bout it."

"Honey," he presses, squeezing her hand.

"Because nobody on my team likes me." She stares blankly at the floor, drops her fork, runs a hand through her hair. It's getting long again.

Joel shakes his head. "That's ridiculous. Everyone likes you."

"Not anymore."

"Why?"

The girl rises, goes into the kitchen, rummages around in the cabinet for a bag of chips. She pulls one out, leans against the wall, pops one into her mouth before checking the expiration date, which is more than a little out of the ordinary. "Cause I'm a jerk."

"No, you ain't."

"That's what Cindy said." She saunters back over to him, holds out the bag.

He shakes his head. "Who cares what Cindy says? She's never been nice to ya because she's jealous."

"Jealous of what?"

"The fact that you're better than her. Baby, I promise ya, you haven't lost any friends." He wraps an arm around her waist, pulls her into his lap, kisses her forehead.

She snickers, tries to push him away. "Daddy, stop. I'm too old for this."

"You'll always be my baby girl. 'Sides, this cheers ya up, and you know it."

Sarah tosses the chips onto the coffee table, wraps her arms around his neck, rests her head against his chest. "Then you can carry me up to bed and tuck me in and do whatever else I want."

He kisses her again, pulls his head back as she squeals in his ear. "I promise, nobody on your team has anythin against ya. Except for Cindy, and that don't really count. Ignore her."

"I thought ignoring people was rude," she says, smiling and finally crawling out of his lap.

"Well, the last thing you need is somebody chipping away at your self-esteem."

"Excuse me!" a soft voice calls through the door. "Hello? Tommy's brother?"

Joel shakes his head, glances down at the broken face of his watch, rubs his thumb over it.

As soon as he pulls the door open, a short blonde girl nearly falls into his arms. Her brow is coated in sweat, and she keeps fumbling with the hem of her shirt. "I'm sorry to intrude, Tommy's brother, but I need your help. Geez, what is your name? Not to be direct, but I feel like a bit of an idiot calling you that."

He puts his hands on her shoulders. "Hey, calm down. Use your words."

She takes a deep breath. "It's your daughter."

He tightens his grip without meaning to, and she winces. "Ellie?"

"She's been bitten."

"I'm not infected!" Ellie calls again, putting the pendant in the palm of her hand and tilting it from side to side to catch the grey light coming in through the window of the barn.

There's no response, as always. Sammy's father has got to have the thickest skull on the face of the earth. But he has the keys.

The redhead flops down on her back, closes her eyes. She wishes, for the briefest second, that she was still outside the walls. Maybe she could find a clicker to kill, to punish, to blame. But that's a foolish wish, and she pounds her fist lightly against her head to knock it away.

"Daddy!" Sammy says in tandem with approaching footsteps. "Let her out."

"What are you talking about? She's gonna turn into one of them."

"No, she's not."

Ellie sits up, picks a few pieces of hay out of her hair. "Come on, Blondie," she whispers.

"You," a deep voice growls. Joel. "Where's Ellie?"

"What the Hell is happening?" Sammy's father exclaims.

Footsteps draw closer, and then the other girl yelps.

"Dad, let go of me."

"You can't go in there. Either of you."

"But she's okay. I need to talk to her."

"Samantha, you are only fifteen. I am not losing you."

"Oh, stop it."

The door finally opens, and Joel is standing in the doorway, holding up a hand to the father, whose face is beat red. "Get up," he snarls

Ellie looks from side to side. She points at herself. "Are you talking at me?"

"Who the fuck else would I be talkin to?"

"Jesus, Joel, calm down then." She doesn't know why she's being so defensive, not really, but she doesn't care. If he's going to lie to her, then she can be angry with him whenever she wants.

He walks in, grabs her arm, hoists her to her feet, pulls her after him. "Thank you kindly," he says to the stunned onlookers.

"Joel, stop," she commands, plants her feet in the mud beside the road, pries herself free of his grasp.

Spinning around on his heels, he gets so close to her that they're breathing the same air. "Do you have any idea how stupid that was? Ya almost got yaself killed."

"But I didn't."

"Do you even care?" he whispers.

She blinks up at him, chews on the inside of her cheek, mind going a million miles a second.

He scoffs. "Come on. We're goin home, and then we're gonna have a talk about how to keep your goddamn secrets."

"No," she blurts out.

"What?"

"No, I don't care." Her lower lip trembles again, but she refuses to cry anymore.

Joel slouches slightly, closes his eyes, whispers something incomprehensible.

She glances down the road, can make out the barn in the distance and the two figures still standing beside it. They're embracing.

"Ellie," he finally mumbles. "What happened to you?"

"Nothing."

"Oh, really?"

An iron ball settles in the pit of her stomach, and she looks down at the ground instead of meeting his gaze. Her cheeks burn. "I forgot to pull my sleeve down. That's all."

"That's all," he mutters to himself, continuing up the street.

She throws another glance at the barn over her shoulder, narrows her eyes at the two hugging silhouettes, wants more than anything to be like them.

Happy.

Peaceful.

Alive.

Ellie doesn't have dinner. She locks herself in her room, sits on the bed, stares at the scar on her arm. There haven't been anymore nosebleeds, but her head is killing her, and she feels faintly ill every time she lies down. When she needs a change of scenery, she stands and returns to the window, stares out at the street.

Sammy is back at her spot beneath the street lamp. She waves frantically when she sees Ellie, makes a motion that looks like opening a door.

"This isn't a fucking door," the redhead says to herself, opening the window and sitting down on the sill, her legs dangling over the edge.

Putting her book to the side, the blonde runs over, stands in front of Tommy's house. "You alright?"

"I'm fucking great."

"Look, I'm sorry that my dad and I freaked on you. We didn't know."

A sigh escapes Ellie's lips, and she tries to give her maybe-friend a smile. "It's alright. I would have done the same thing."

Clasping her hands behind her back, Sammy scuffs up little clouds of dirt and dust with her sneakers. "Your secret is safe with me, and my dad won't say a word either. He's a good guy, as hard as it may be for you to believe. Him and Tommy go way back."

"Cool." The redhead fingers the pendant she's wearing around her neck, presses her free hand to her temple, bares her teeth as a spike of pain shoots through her brain.

"So," the other girl drawls out, "in all seriousness, are you okay? You kinda scared me."

Ellie laughs bitterly. "Sure I did. Being trapped in the barn with a runner probably wasn't on your to-do list."

"No, I'm not talking about that."

She kicks the warm night air, watches her blistered feet slip in and out of shadow. "Don't worry about me."

"You didn't answer my question."

"That's all you're gonna get."

Sammy puts her hands in her pockets. "Can we hang out? I know you think you're dangerous or something, but I don't care. You're a good person, and I want you to have a friend."

"You're signing your death warrant."

"Then consider me dead. I'll see you around, Ellie." The blonde walks across the street, grabs her book, holds it to her chest, vanishes down an alleyway.

"How are you feeling?" Riley takes a sip from her water bottle, wipes the sweat from her brow, closes her eyes.

"Fine, I guess. You should go to sleep; I'll take watch." Ellie scratches her side, stands, cracks her back, tries to ignore the pain in her spine and hip, heavily bruised in the fall from the rafters that were so close, so close, so far.

The other girl chuckles, kicks her shoes off. "Not a chance. I got you into this, and I'm not taking a nap while you do all the work."

"Stop," Ellie commands, running her fingertips over the bandage on her forearm. "We both came, we both made the choice to stay, we both fucked up."

"I never said it was a fuck up."

She walks back over to the brightly lit carousel, kicks off her own shoes, wiggles her blistered toes.

"It would only have been a fuck up if you hadn't come with me. That sounds terrible, but it's true." Riley smiles, coughs, spits into the grass.

The redhead smiles, feels the butterflies fill her empty stomach. "I'm starving."

"I don't have any food, but I do have this, thanks to Winston." Reaching into the backpack she recovered after the infected scurried back to their holes, the older girl pulls out a bottle of whiskey.

"You took that?" Ellie asks, laughing for no real reason.

"Of course I did. Now, do you want some?"

"Hell yeah." The younger girl sits back down, takes the bottle by the neck, gulps down as much as she can before she has to stop to catch her breath.

Riley rolls her eyes. "Slow down, El. I got it for us, okay? Us? As in me and you?"

"Right," her friend says, wincing as the whiskey burns her throat. "You and me."

"'Sides, you're tiny, and you can't hold your liquor."

Ellie laughs again, claps her hands, stretches her legs out in front of her and waits for her turn with the bottle. "I can too. Size doesn't matter."

As she hands it back, Riley coughs again, wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. "Right."

Another drink makes her head spin, and the younger girl remembers that, well, maybe she is a bit of a lightweight. But it isn't like she'll be waking up to a hangover. She reaches into her pocket, pulls out the joke book.

They read. They laugh. They're on top of the world, then they're crying their eyes out, then they're on top of the world again. Maybe there's another kiss, maybe that's all in Ellie's head. She's having a hard time standing, she's dancing around while Riley lies down to get rid of the pain in her head.

"You know what?" the redhead asks as she climbs onto a carousel horse.

"What?"

"I think you're right. Option two is so much fucking better than option one." She giggles, hiccups, nearly falls off of her steed.

"What was option three?"

"Huh?"

"You asked what option three was. What did I say? Oh, damn, we're all out."

She purses her lips in thought, hiccups again. "Whatever. This is why I don't drink; I hate having the hiccups."

Riley rolls onto her back, stares up at the stars through the hole in the mall ceiling. "What should I wish for?"

"Food. Wish for, like, oh, man, what would be good right now? I don't even care, just ask for a lot of it."

"No, really, what should I wish for?"

"Dude, what are you talkin about?"

"Shooting star. Gotta make a wish."

Ellie feels the heat rise to her cheeks again, and she leans forwards in her saddle. "You-"

Before she realizes what's happening, she's falling to the side, banging her head against the floor, seeing nothing but darkness. Maybe she's dead. Maybe the virus takes you that quick, rips out your humanity and replaces it with pure, unadulterated anger and hatred.

But she's not dead.

She can hear labored breathing, and at first she thinks it's hers. But then her eyes flutter open, she remembers where she is, she picks herself off of the ground, she cradles her head in her hands, and she returns to Riley.

Kind of.

It's not really Riley. Riley didn't have such grey skin. Riley didn't have what look like vines crawling around beneath her skin. Riley didn't growl, didn't moan, didn't make those all-too familiar sounds.

Ellie clamps her hands over her mouth, feels the truth land on top of her, feels her heart clench so painfully that it knocks her to her knees, makes her think she's going into cardiac arrest. If she wakes that thing – Riley – up, then it'll attack her. She doesn't get to say goodbye. No, no, she doesn't get to say goodbye.

Why? How is that fair? Why isn't she turning? Why is she still alive? Why? Why? Why?

"Don't go," she whispers without meaning to.

The runner's eyes shoot open, land on her. Not friend; prey.

There's no memory of how they met. There's no memory of how they met the Fireflies. There's no memory of the first night they slept in the same bed, wrapped up in each other's arms because it felt so much safer, so much warmer, so much happier. There's no memory of how they sat together in the cafeteria, making quiet jokes about the buffoons marching between the tables with machine guns and permanent scowls. There's no memory of the fight, of the words that almost tore them apart forever. There's no memory of last night, of their reunion, of their trip, of their escape. There's no memory of anything.

Riley lunges forwards, screeches at the top of her lungs.

Ellie falls backwards, scurries away on her elbows, starts crying and screaming at the same time. "Stop!"

Another lunge, fingernails dig into her ankle.

"Please, Riley, stop!"

Teeth glimmer in the sunshine pouring through the hole in the roof, and Ellie acts on instinct, kicks the runner in the face, crawls away, feels like she's going to throw up and pass out. Her hand is wrapped around something, and she looks down without the slightest clue of what it is.

It's a gun. Riley's gun.

"No!" Ellie begs, not to the runner, not to God, not to anyone but herself. She's lifting the gun, she's trying not to, she's fingering the trigger, she's trying not to, she's aiming at the runner's head, Riley's head, and she's trying so desperately to throw the weapon to the side and let whatever will happen happen, but she can't.

Boom.

Riley is blown onto her back. A small pool of blood begins to form around her head, soaking her clothes and tinting her grey skin a dull shade of red.

The gun falls to the ground. Ellie stares at the body, her mouth hanging open, tears streaming silently down her cheeks, cutting paths through the dirt and grime and red. A single cry escapes her lips, she curls into a ball, squeezes her eyes shut and bangs her head against the ground until she's dizzy and bruised and in so much pain that she can barely see straight. She looks up, crawls towards the corpse, holds its hand and intertwines its limp fingers with her own. As if a link has been established, the memories flash through her mind, make her feel worse.

The memory of how they met. The memory of how they met the Fireflies. The memory of the first night they slept in the same bed, wrapped up in each other's arms because it felt so much safer, so much warmer, so much happier. The memory of how they sat together in the cafeteria, making quiet jokes about the bafoons marching between the tables with machine guns and permanent scowls. The memory of the fight, of the words that could never have torn them apart forever. The memory of last night, of their reunion, of their trip, of their failed escape. The memory of the only thing that could have torn them apart and now has.

She takes the pendant from around the runner's neck, holds it to her chest and rocks back and forth, back and forth, back and forth.

"I love you.

"Please.

"Don't go."

Whatever sound comes out next is caught between a cry and an inappropriately timed chuckle; she woke up with a hangover after all.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: Here's the next chapter. The next few chapters are going to get pretty intense. A lot has happened to these characters, a lot is weighing on them, and there are consequences to every action. Anyways, enjoy, and please leave a review! **

**"It can't be for nothing." - Ellie **

Chapter 8: Time Tries to Heal All Wounds

Ellie puts the mask back on.

She pretends to be happy. She walks around town with this stupid grin on her face, her hair pulled back into twin bangs, her long sleeves always covering the wound on her arm no matter how hot it is, her new clothes constantly smelling fresh instead of muddy and salty and sweaty. Whenever she's around Tommy, Maria, and Joel, she laughs along with them, acts like she's listening as one of the gang when, in reality, she's lost in her thoughts.

Months pass by, and she starts to admit to herself that Sammy isn't half bad. Her dad apologized profusely for the incident at the barn, and he's kept his word; nobody else knows about the bite mark, about the immunity, about the cure that was never made. His energetic little spite of a daughter seems to see Ellie as her only real friend, and it's not until the start of winter that the reason steps into the spotlight

Sammy killed her mother. She was infected, and an eight year old had to pull the trigger while Daddy was off hunting.

It isn't just that Sammy likes Ellie's attitude; she sees herself in her new, as she says, BFF.

The snowflakes start to fall, the heat gets dialed up, and Ellie finds herself having a harder and harder time keeping the mask from freezing and shattering into tiny pieces. David come back; he haunts her dreams, creeps in through her window at night, puts his disgusting little fingers on her throat, presses down on her adam's apple until she feels like her head is going to explode.

She stops eating again, hides it well with baggy clothes that she manages to buy from the marketplace in exchange for squirrel meat. The few pounds she managed to gain during the fall drop off, and she spends days at a time curled up on the couch, sleeping but not really sleeping, resting but not really resting. Colder days bring more nosebleeds, warm blankets aren't warm enough, and she feels like she's rotting from the inside out.

"Ellie?"

Her hair falls in front of her face as she looks up.

"I thought you'd be asleep," Tommy says, stepping into the room and rubbing sleep from his eyes.

"I was." She leans back in her chair, puts her book down in her lap.

His hands slip into his pockets. "Wind is howlin, huh? I'm gonna get a glass of water. You want one?"

"Sure, Uncle Tommy. Thanks." Again, the fake smile, the head tilted to the side, the fifteen year old actress who almost never gets out of character. She waits until his footsteps fade, lets her face fall, gets to her feet, peeks out the window.

Of course, Sammy isn't standing in the middle of a blizzard. Still, the younger girl finds herself wanting for company outside of the house. Tomorrow, maybe she should go over to Sammy's and ask to stay there for a night or two. It probably won't help, but who knows?

He reappears in the doorway without a sound, hands her a plastic cup, clinks his against hers. "Cheers."

"Cheers," she echoes, takes too large a gulp, coughs, pounds her fist against her chest. "Jesus."

"You alright?"

"Yeah, yeah." Clearing her throat, she closes the book, gathers her blankets and switches off the lamp.

They walk out into the hallway, return to their respective bedrooms after a quick hug. She stares at the sleeping figure on the bed, sees the moonlight glance off of the face of the broken watch, feels anger tickle the back of her throat like bile, quietly pads out of the room, downstairs. Muttering curses about nothing in particular, she puts on her boots, her coat, her new hat with the ear flaps, steps out into the howling winds and heavy snowflakes.

She isn't quite sure how she gets to Sammy's front porch, but she gets there all the same, knocks on the door, mentally kicks herself when she realizes that she's waking them up.

The door finally opens. Sammy is dressed in cotton pajama pants, a sweater, and a nightcap. Her nose is red, the collar of her shirt is somehow drenched in sweat, and she's swaying slightly from side to side. "El? What time is it?"

"I need to talk to you."

"Now?"

"Yes, now."

"Look, I'm sick. You don't want to come in here."

"T'hen come to my house."

"I'll get your family sick."

Ellie frowns, bats her eyelashes. "Please?"

Sammy leans against the doorway. "Come back tomorrow morning, okay? I promise we'll talk then."

"Bu-"

"How urgent is it?"

The redhead rubs her gloved hands together, hugs herself, turns away. "Fine. See you tomorrow."

"Oh, geez. Ellie, wait."

But she doesn't.

She's back at her house, taking off her boots, her coat, her new hat with the ear flaps. Hot tears stream down her cheeks, she's ashamed, she sits down on the couch and combs her fingers through her hair until the tedium knocks her out cold.

"Deep breath." Marcus places his hand on the small of Sammy's back, listens, nods, steps away, puts his stethoscope in the bag slung over his shoulder.

"Well?" she asks, wiping away a fresh coating of sweat on her forehead.

He rolls his eyes. "Stop being such a hypochondriac. You're going to be fine."

"I thought the flu used to be a big deal."

"Not listening to me," he says, putting a finger to his lips. "You're fine. Get some rest."

She stands, zips up her winter coat, groans when she sees the snowflakes lazily drifting down from the thick grey clouds overhead.

"Can we head out, Doc?" Ellie asks, sitting on a small three-legged stool in the corner of the makeshift office.

Marcus waves them off, waits until Sammy is half-way out the door, holds up his finger. "Actually, Ellie, would you mind staying a minute?"

The wind slipping in through the open door whips her ponytail about her face. "I guess. Tell Joel where I am, alright?"

The blonde nods, hurries off into the blizzard, vanishes without a trace.

Tucking loose strands of hair behind her ear, the younger girl saunters back over to the stool, plops down, swings her legs from side to side. As much as she likes Marcus, doctors make her nervous. She doesn't know why. "What's up?"

He pulls a chair over, sits down, crosses his legs, massages his temples like he's having a migraine. "How is everything with you?"

She narrows her eyes, wipes her nose. "Why?"

"You didn't answer my question."

"Are you a psychiatrist?" She kicks herself. "Right. Duh."

Marcus chuckles, composes himself again, tilts his head to the side.

Fingering the pendant, she throws a glance over her shoulder at the door, wonders if she'll be able to escape if she makes a break for it. "I'm cool."

"Really?"

"I'm cool," she repeats, not liking where this conversation is going. The first time he'd given her what he called a check-up, he'd used a bunch of fancy words she didn't understand. What a malnourished is, she'll never know.

Drumming his fingertips against the arms of the chair, he grimaces. "Can I be direct with you?"

"I'd prefer it." She'd prefer it from Joel too, but that's not going to happen.

"I can tell just by looking at you that you've lost weight. That's a bad thing."

Her heart drops to her feet.

He raises his eyebrows. "And, wild guess, I bet you knew about it."

"Why would you say that?" she asks quickly. Too quickly.

"Because you're not a happy person."

She feels exposed, almost like she's naked and clothed at the same time. Letting go of the pendant, she starts chewing on her nails, looks down at the floor.

Marcus puts a hand on her shoulder. "I'm not trying to make you feel uncomfortable, but I can see that I did a pretty horrible job of that. It's my job to read people, Ellie, and you're not all that hard to read."

"Can I go?"

He frowns, pulls back. "What's causing it? Are you not eating at all?"

"It doesn't fucking matter." Guilt slaps her across the face, so she backpedals, apologizes, starts fiddling with the hem of her sweater.

Silence.

"I'm not trying to, to get skinnier or something, but I don't have an appetite."

Silence. His brow is creased; he's thinking, and she doesn't want to know what he has to say.

"Doc, I gotta go. Sammy might need my help. Bye."

"El-"

The wind slams the front door shut behind her, and she finds herself running home through a blizzard once again.

Sarah at the beach, her blonde hair hanging in front of her face, her legs dangling over the edge of a pier, rays of a dying sun peering out from behind her head and her smile.

Sarah at her twelfth birthday party, her last birthday party. One of those stupid pointed hats with polka dots on her head, a small wrapped present in her hands, Joel beside her with his arm around her shoulders.

He stares at the pictures on the mantle for what feels like the billionth time, rubs his thumb over the cold glass surfaces of the frames. Tommy had been thorough when he went back to Texas; she hadn't liked these pictures, had put them in her dresser drawer after they were taken. Nobody understood why.

"Where's Ellie?" Maria asks, sauntering over with a pair of socks.

"She took Sammy to Marcus's. You just missed her." He doesn't look away from the mantle.

She sits down on the couch, puts on the socks, leans back and drums her fingertips on her knees. "Can I ask you something?"

"Shoot."

"Did you notice that she always goes right to her room after dinner?"

He looks over his shoulder, shrugs. "Okay."

Maria folds her hands in her lap. "I was curious, so I walked past about five minutes after she went in last night. She was crying."

His body stiffens.

"She avoids us like the plague, Joel; she's always hanging out with Samantha or wandering around by herself. Maybe she fooled Tommy with her smiles, but she hasn't fooled me, and I doubt she's fooled you."

"What are ya insinuating?" he asks, feeling like she's backing him into a corner.

"That you know what's bothering her, what's been bothering her since you two got here. You weren't completely honest with me back in April." It isn't a question.

The gunshot that killed Marlene replays itself in his head, and his hands curl into fists at his sides. He quickly hides them in his pockets, walks over to the window, peeks out into the blizzard, wills his brother to get back from guard duty.

"Well?" Maria asks, crossing her arms over her chest. "She's my niece, and I deserve to know. I've kept my suspicions buried long enough."

"Yeah, well, that's what they are. Suspicions."

"You're awfully defensive."

Joel glowers at her. "It's not my place to tell ya how Ellie feels. That's her business."

She scoffs. "Fair enough. How about you tell me who that pendant belongs to, then?"

"What pendant?"

"The one she always wears around her neck, plays with, tosses around when she's at home. She's obsessed with that thing."

"How am I supposed to know? I didn't ask her."

"It's a Firefly pendant."

"Yes, Maria, yes it is."

"What happened at the hospital?"

He turns away again, immediately wishes he could punch himself in the face; no better way to admit that you're hiding something. "Where did that come from?"

The couch squeaks as she gets to her feet, walks over to him. "You said that what happened with the Fireflies didn't work out. Could you be a little more specific?"

"She didn't get the pendant from Colorado."

"How do you know that?"

"Because she was unconscious."

Her mouth falls open.

Joel's eyes widen, and he finds himself resisting the urge to punch a hole in the wall. End the conversation, he needs to end the conversation now, but how can he after dropping that bomb? The questions are practically oozing out of his sister-in-law's eyes already.

"Why? What happened to her?"

The bus goes under, the little auburn haired girl is swept away by the current, he pries the doors open, chases her, can't get her to breathe. Ethan, that was his name, Ethan knocks him out, takes them back to those lunatics.

Swallowing, not making eye contact. "She drowned."

"Jesus Christ. You didn't think that was an important detail until now? What were you doing? How could you let her-"

"Don't ya dare," he growls, finally meeting her gaze. "I tried to help her. All I've done is try to help her, to protect her, to give her a better life."

"And?" she spits. "She was knocked out, so you skipped over the Fireflies and came back here, figured it wasn't worth it anymore? What if she had broken a bone or something? They could have helped her."

"They didn't want to."

"Huh?"

"They . . ." He stops himself, finally takes a fist out of his pocket, forces himself to unclench it, holds it up. Not now. The truth has a time and a place, and this – here and now – isn't it.

Maria scoffs again, returns to the couch. "Tell me what happened."

"They couldn't make a cure."

"Why?"

"Because they fuckin' couldn't! Why is that so hard for you to believe? I don't know where she got the pendant, I don't know what's bumming her out, I don't know any of this!"

"They what, Joel?"

Something snaps. "They tried to kill her!"

There's a quiet click from the kitchen, but he doesn't hear it, doesn't notice Maria looking over her shoulder, doesn't see her holding up her own hand.

"Those bastards wanted to kill her," he says. "They thought that maybe, just maybe, they could make a cure if they murdered a child. So, no, I didn't let them do it. No, I didn't let them kill my daughter so that they could save humanity. Save? Save what? There's nothing out there to save!"

"Jo-"

"And that arrogant, hypocritical bitch had the nerve to tell me that I was in the wrong. I don't know what Tommy saw in her because she was out of her goddamn mind. Killing her was doing a service to . . ." He trails off, feels like the air has been forced from his lungs.

Ellie stands in the doorway, her big green eyes wide, her small form trembling. Melted snowflakes drip from loose locks of her auburn hair, pitter patter against the floor.

He takes a step towards her, opens his arms. "Baby Girl."

She puts a hand to her stomach like she's going to be sick, shakes her head at nothing and nobody, retreats into the kitchen.

"Baby."

"Do-don't," she chokes out. "Stay away from me."

"Ellie, I'm sorry. I was going to tell you, I was going to tell you everything, but you've been so quiet, and I didn't want to make it worse for you." Again, he opens his arms, figures he should let her come to him.

But she doesn't. Her breathing becomes more ragged, she opens her mouth and closes it rapidly, hangs her head over the sink, dry heaves until her legs give out.

Joel wants to hug her, to kiss her cheek, to stroke her hair and make it all go away, but he can't because he's created this mess. No, that's not right; he saved her. She'd be dead if he hadn't intervened, hadn't stopped the Fireflies.

The operating room, the doctor hovering over her sleeping figure with a scalpel in his hand and a sick glimmer in his eyes. Stupid, misguided threats that couldn't have been carried out, a gurgle as the scalpel penetrates flesh, those sick eyes roll back in the head.

That nurse had called him an animal, but her friend had shut her up.

It was all for her, for Ellie, for his baby, for his daughter.

She stands, looks like she's ready to pass out. "I'm going to Sammy's. Don't follow me."

"Wait, let's talk about this."

"Please," she begs, presses shaking hands to her temples. "Aunt Maria?"

The woman knits her eyebrows together, mouths an apology to her brother-in-law that he doesn't know if he deserves. "What, Sweetie?"

"Can you bring me my backpack? I need to go."

"Of course. Take all the time you need."

The girl nods, takes in a big gulp of air, leaves.

That's it. She leaves.

He stands in the kitchen, alone as Maria leaves to get her niece's bag. Alone.

Like he was the night Sarah died.

Like he was the night Tommy left.

Like he was when he woke up in the hospital.

Sammy doesn't ask questions, doesn't protest, doesn't say anything about the tears steaming down her friend's cheeks. Instead, she sets up the guest bedroom, tells her dad that they'll be having company for a few days, sits with Ellie for a few hours and gives her a literal shoulder to cry on.

"I'm sorry," the younger girl whispers, her voice raw.

"For what?"

"All of this." She wipes her eyes, sits up, fingers the pendant, feels like breaking down again, puts it in her pocket and tries to forget that it's there.

The blonde rolls her eyes. "Relax. 'Sides, you're the one who's risking getting sick."

Ellie forces a giggle, but they both know there's nothing real behind it.

They listen to the distant sound of thunder, listen to the bed frame squeaking beneath them, listen to the pieces of life that don't matter because the parts that do are too ugly. Night falls, and they're still sitting there, staring off into space.

Without a word, Sammy gets up, walks out, closes the door.

"How is she?" her dad asks, his quiet voice barely managing to penetrate the wall.

"I don't know," his daughter responds, collapses into a brief coughing fit. "Thanks for being so understanding."

There's a weird sound that could either be interpreted as a laugh or a sigh. "I owe her after everything she's done for you."

Ellie narrows her eyes, presses her ear to the peeling wall paper.

"It's so good to see my little girl happy again."

Sammy giggles. "Stop being such a sap, Dad."

Their voices fade along with their footsteps, and Ellie falls back against her pillow, tries once again to process everything that's happened.

She helped Sammy? With what? What could she possibly do? Is that why Joel saved her? Because he thinks she's a good person? He's wrong. He's so wrong. Even if Sammy is better off, that's one kid, one kid against the hundreds of thousands who will die because there is no cure, no chance, no hope. Jackson can't take everybody in.

Rolling onto her side, she stares at the lamp on the nightstand, switches it off, yawns, wraps herself up in her blankets and curls into a ball. Is she supposed to leave the town, free up a spot for somebody else? Is that how she makes her peace?

Everything happens for a reason.

Was he right? Was that monster - his crazy, cannibalistic, perverted mind aside - actually onto something?

The door opens again, and she pretends to be asleep.

A soft hand, heated by fever, scratches her back. "Goodnight, Ellie. I'm here for you, and I hope you feel better tomorrow."

The scratching stops, and the door closes again.

It's like the first day they met all over again; there are butterflies in her stomach, and her heart is pounding like a bongo drum. And she's forgotten what she was so freaked out about.


	9. Chapter 9

**A/N: Hey, everybody! Sorry for the particularly long time in between updates. This chapter, although short, was really tough to get right, and I've been jumping around between doing this chapter and a few of the future ones, which are built directly off of this. That'll all make sense soon, I suppose. Anyways, as I said in a previous note, it will be getting more intense; this chapter is more serious than the last, the next will be more serious than this, etc. Thanks for sticking with me, and I'll definitely try to have the next chapter up by next Saturday or Sunday. The end is nearing. **

Chapter 9: Necessary

Jackson, Wyoming.

From the ridge, it looks like a veritable paradise. From the ridge, it looks like a window into what she imagines the past was. From the ridge, it looks like the home she's always wanted. From the ridge, it looks like the final destination. From the inside, it doesn't look like any of those things.

She wipes her eyes, turns her back to the town, walks away.

Joel tries to imagine that Ellie is curled up beside him, her back to his, her auburn hair fanning about her head on the pillow, her increasingly skinny body wrapped up in a blanket, her soft breathing in sync with his heartbeat. But he knows she's not there.

The bed is half-empty, has been for three days now. He could go over to Sammy's house, he could get his daughter back, but she wouldn't go with him willingly. Of course, he knows she needs time. Of course, he knows that he should have told her the truth right off the bat. Of course, he's made a lot of mistakes.

That doesn't mean that he regrets stopping the Fireflies. That doesn't mean he wishes he had let her die at that hospital.

Tommy has been understanding, more understanding than Maria, actually. He must understand, he must have known that the Fireflies were losing control, or he never would have left them. Who would? They sound like heroes, like messiahs, like they have all the answers when, in reality, they're as clueless and desperate and dirty and angry and evil as anyone else. It's all in the presentation, and the government is easier to hate.

Tired of pretending that she's still with him, Joel gets up and rummages through his backpack until he finds the picture that Maria took of Ellie with an old polaroid camera the two had managed to scrounge up.

She's fifteen, but she looks so much younger than that. Her freckled cheeks, her ponytail, her crooked smile are the same as they've always been, but the eyes are different. Every day, every single day, they get dimmer, they get harsher, they get emptier.

He puts the picture away, rubs his eyes, sits on the floor with his back up against the wall and doesn't move until the sun rises and he realizes that, at some point, for a short while, he managed to fall asleep. Now, his back aches, his legs are stiff, and he doesn't want to move at all.

"Come on, Daddy," Sarah says, holding out her hand and tapping her bare foot against the floor. She's still wearing her pajamas, but there's no blood spatter over her stomach.

"Not now, Baby."

Shaking her head, she pulls Ellie's picture out of the pack and smiles. "Aw, she's so cute!"

"Put it away," Joel whispers.

"What? She's my sister, isn't she?"

"No. She's not my daughter."

"But ya said that she is. You keep thinking it to yourself."

"Sarah."

She puts her hands up, sits in his lap, leans her head against his chest. Her blonde hair is messy, tangled; she always got the worst bed head. He'd tease her about it, and she'd muss his up, giggle, say, "Look, now we're even."

The snow begins to fall once again, and it becomes harder and harder to imagine that winter will ever end, that the spring will ever come, that the white will ever melt away, that the green will ever poke through, that the sun will ever be warm again.

Sarah hugs her knees to her chest, takes his arms, wraps them around her waist. "It'll work out, ya know. Ya did the right thing, and she'll come round."

"I'd like to believe that."

"Then do it."

"Joel?" Tommy is standing in the doorway, his hands in his pockets.

"Uncle Tommy!" Sarah chirps, hops to her feet, embraces him.

"What?" the older man asks, forcing himself to stand and crack his protesting spine.

"Ellie's here."

He's halfway down the stair case a second later, rushing into the living room, stopping short when he sees her. It's not her, but it is. It's been three days, but it's been three years.

Her eyes are so sunken, her frown is so deep, her frame is so diminutive. "Hey."

"Hey," he chokes out, catching Maria's gaze from the couch. "How are you doin?"

"Fine," she so clearly lies, gestures to the front door. "Can we talk on the porch?"

"Okay."

Sarah kicks at a chunk of ice on the top step, glances up at him every now and again, flashes a shy grin.

He sits beside Ellie, holds her hand and rubs circles into her palm with his thumb. Streams of vapor escape her lips with each shuddering breath, and she shoves her free hand into her jacket pocket. "I'm sorry I left," she finally says.

"You had every right."

Her big green eyes swivel to bore into his own. "Why didn't you tell me when we were still in Utah? I would have understood then too."

"Wait," he stammers, "you're not mad?"

She opens her mouth like she's about to say something, but she shrugs instead. "I dunno. Like I said, I would have understood. I understand now. Does that mean I'm not angry? Maybe."

Sniffling, Sarah skips over and wraps her hands around her sister's neck. "See? Right there! You do think of her like your daughter."

"Would you have?" he asks the older girl.

"Would I have what?"

"Actually have understood in Utah?"

"Yes."

"I'm not so sure."

"Alright, look, either way, it wasn't your place to hide it." She pulls away, crosses her legs, makes a snowball, throws it out into the middle of the street where it shatters imperceptibly amongst an endless sea of nothing.

Joel chews on his lower lip, tastes blood. "Why did you come back? You're stuff is still at Sammy's, I assume, so you're not moving back in."

Her bitter chuckle slices through the frozen and silent air, cleaves it in two. "No, I'm not coming back. I don't know what I'm going to do."

"You can't stay there forever."

"Then I'll leave Jackson." Fire comes from her mouth instead of vapor.

He glares. "Don't even joke about that."

"Who says it was a joke?"

"Do you know what would happen to you out there?" he asks, his tone harsher than he means it to be. "You'd die."

She stands, looks down on him. It feels like it should be the other way around. "I made it for a whole year, didn't I? And I'd never been outside of Boston."

"You only made it because I was there to help you."

Her hands curl into fists at her sides, and she looks ready to punch him in the gut. "Bullshit. I kept you alive, not the other way around."

"What are you talkin about? Ya would have died at the hospital."

"I was fucking supposed to!" Her hands uncurl, and she pulls her hat off, throws it to the ground, stomps it deep into the ever-rising blanket of snow. "God!"

"Ellie." He tries to reach out to her, but she slaps his hand away.

Her face twists into something wholly unlike itself, and she starts punching his arm. "Why couldn't you have let me die? Why couldn't you have walked away? I wouldn't have felt anything; I wouldn't have known anything had ever happened!"

"Stop!" he shouts.

"Why should I?" Stepping back and catching her breath, she picks her hat out of the snow, shakes it off, puts it back on her head, curses, throws it onto the porch, shakes the melting flakes out of her hair.

Sarah tugs on his sleeve. "Fix it, Daddy. Try and find common ground."

Ellie is halfway down the street, her hair bouncing around her head in the wind.

He runs, catches up to her. "Look, let's talk about this."

"I did."

"How can you say that you'd rather be dead?" The words seem to slow her down for a second, and he manages to get in front of her. "How can you say that this life won't get better?"

She gestures to herself, shakes her head. "Joel, the only person I ever loved is dead."

"What?" he half yells.

"No, the only person I ever loved . . . like, loved loved. That's why I needed to make the cure, that's why I needed to save the world. I see her face every day, and I can't take it anymore."

His face falls, and he unconsciously looks to the pendant hanging from her neck. "Riley?"

A nod.

"Baby Girl, I'm so sorry."

"Fuck you." She brushes past him, and he doesn't stop her.

Sarah is still on the porch.

And then she's not.

Ellie and Sammy sit on the roof of her house, watching the sun set, watching the hues of purple and orange and yellow get replaced with splotches of black and blue. It's like the town is being beaten up, thrashed, bruised.

They both shiver slightly, even in their heavy coats, but it's worth it to be up here, especially for Ellie, though her friend doesn't fully understand why. Not a word passes between them, but they hug when they get up and head inside. Again, Ellie feels a warm, tingly feeling at their touch, but she doesn't care about it this time because it doesn't matter.

Nothing in Jackson matters anymore.

Dinner is as quiet as it has been, but there's an odd comfort in that for everyone at the table. As a family washes the dishes, the lone girl, the orphan, the infected outcast goes up to her room, pretends to be asleep, tries to remember what it feels like to lie in a bed and not have to roll over and over until she finds a position that doesn't hurt her back or her side or her head. It's almost committed to memory by the time footsteps bounce off of the hallway walls and Sammy steps inside.

"Night, El," she whispers.

Breathing a sigh of relief when the house goes quiet, Ellie gets out of bed, cracks her back, changes into a pair of heavy sweatpants and a green sweater, pulls on her winter coat, puts on a pair of mittens and her new hat with the ear flaps. Her backpack was never emptied, so she brings it to the living room, props it up against the front door, turns, wishes she could sit here and read all the books piled up against the opposite wall.

She scolds herself for doing it as she tiptoes back towards the bedrooms, slips into Sammy's, sits on the edge of the mattress and wishes so deeply that she could . . .

That she could what? Do what? What is she doing here? What does Sammy mean? Sammy is a random girl in a random city that a random guy brought her to after randomly deciding to save her.

Scoffing into her jacket, standing, leaving, grabbing her backpack, opening the door, stepping into the cold, never looking back.

Jackson, Wyoming.

From the ridge, it looks like a veritable paradise, even at night. From the ridge, it looks like a window into what she imagines the past was. From the ridge, it looks like the home she's always wanted. From the ridge, it looks like the final destination. From the inside, it doesn't look like any of those things.

She wipes her eyes, turns her back to the town, walks away.

Only this time, she doesn't chicken out and turn around.


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N: Hey, everybody! Here's the sixth part of the post-spring act. As always, thanks for sticking with the story, and please leave a review if you have the time. Until chapter eleven . . . **

**"Maybe it was meant to be." - Marlene**

Chapter 10: Hypothermia, My New BFF

It hits her as she hoists herself up onto a rock outcropping and holds her hand to her eyes to shield them from the sun. It hits her as she sees the freezing Wyoming landscape stretch out in front of her, daring her to try and cross it. It hits her as the wind picks up and the thick blanket of snow begins to swirl around her and whip her already numb cheeks. It hits her that she didn't bring a blanket.

She sighs, knows she'll never get out of Jackson again if she tries and goes back, trudges onwards. Her jacket flaps about her like the cloaks those guys wear in Tommy's old wizard movies. The snow fills in the empty spaces in her boots, and, by the time the sun begins to set and she knows she's far enough away that she won't be found tonight by search parties, she can't feel her toes.

By nightfall, she's found a small wooden shack. Pulling her pistol out of the waistband of her jeans, she eases the door open, slowly steps inside, tests her weight against every floorboard like it might explode. The shack is only one room, so all she has to do is check inside of a small closet to be sure that she's alone.

Ellie takes off her boots, dumps the snow on the tiny porch outside, sits with her back against a wall and tries to massage some feeling back into her feet. An almost violent shiver shakes her slight frame, and the few memories she has of last winter when she was too sick to move come back to her.

"Fuck," she whispers, rummages through the closet. No blankets; only a few tattered coats. She puts her pistol beside her, takes the coats down from their hangers, makes them into something that reminds her of a rat's nest, curls up inside of it, tries to catch some sleep.

She dreams that she's back in Jackson, sitting next to Sammy in Marcus's office. He's telling the blonde that she's infected, that she's going to die, that she has maybe two days. Sammy cries for a long time, but she lashes out when Ellie tries to soothe her. And then it's not Sammy anymore, it's Joel getting infected. And then it's not Joel anymore, it's Tommy, then Maria, then Sammy's father, then Riley.

"Check in there."

Ellie sits bolt upright, picks up her weapon, presses her ear to the closet door. The front door to the shack squeaks open.

"Jesus fucking Christ, Nathan," the same voice says, "we ain't gonna find anyone out here."

A different voice, a hoarser voice, one that reminds her far too much of David and a cold cell and a burning restaurant and grimy hands on her throat: "Shut up, Roger. You heard that old man; somebody got out of Jackson. And that means she's gonna help us get in."

Old man? Joel? Did he go out after her?

Please, that's not even a question.

Did they kill him?

Her grip on the weapon tightens, and she fingers the trigger as she feels hot tears prick the backs of her eyes.

"Why didn't we force the old man to help?" a third voice asks.

"Cause, stupid, he looked like the fuckin' Hulk. I ain't gonna get into a brawl with that," Roger spits.

She doesn't know what a Hulk is, but she quietly sighs with relief, changes her plan from kill back to wait out.

'Look, they said it was a fifteen year old girl. How do we even know she's still alive?"

Nathan chuckles. "Cause I can see her right now."

Her heart stops. She looks down, sees the little hole in the corner of the closet door, sees that the toes of her left foot are sticking out. A cold sweat slips down her brow, and she puts her finger back on the trigger.

"Come on out," he says, now more David than his own self. "We want to talk."

Before she can respond, the door is thrown open, and a short man with a receding hairline is standing over her. "Aw, look at you. Ya don't belong out here all by yourself."

She raises her gun automatically, without even realizing that she's doing it, and his eyes widen right before a bullet buries itself in his forehead. Diving between his legs, making a break for the door, she's out on the porch, and another three guns are in her face.

"God dammit!" Roger shrieks. "How many people are we going to lose this winter, Nate? Now we're getting picked off by a kid?"

The three new men have their hoods drawn up, so she can't see their faces, but she can feel their eyes on her, roaming, violating. Taking a step back, she glances over her shoulder and sees her backpack in the far corner of the shack. "No."

"No what, Kid?" Nathan asks. His skeletal face is bundled up in a grey beard in the same way that the rest of his body is bundled up in heavy winter clothing. He follows her gaze before she can look away, smiles, picks up her pack and slings it over his shoulder.

Ellie looks back out at the gunmen, tries to see a way around them without getting her brains blown out. There isn't one. One day, she made it one day on her own without being caught. How stupid is she?

"She even payin attention?" Roger wonders aloud.

"I dunno," a gunman says, but the darkness makes it impossible to tell which one. "The old man said something about her not bein in her right mind. Figures that we gotta catch the nutcase."

And that's when it hits her. They need her alive, so they can't blow her brains out. As long as they can't don't catch her, she can run right towards the barrel of one of their guns. But her pack.

Her mother's note is still inside.

"Grab her," Nathan commands.

One of the gunmen lunges forwards, and Ellie dives between his legs. Her foot connects with his jaw, knocking him to the ground. She scrambles to her feet, runs, slips her pistol back into her jeans and weaves in and out of the trees.

Bullets kick up the snow around her feet.

Of course, shooting her legs out wouldn't kill her.

"Shit, shit, shit," she spits into the night air, leaps over a large rock sticking out of the white powder, trips on a twig and falls onto her side. "Shit!"

"I see her!" one the men calls.

She's on her hands and knees, she's crawling forwards, a bullet is missing her ear by an inch, she's on her feet again, she's running, running, running, she's panting, she feels like she's dying, there's a brutally sharp pain in her chest.

"Where is she?"

There's a sickening snap and a crunch, and she can't stop the scream that escapes her blue lips. Warm blood drenches the snow and ice. A bear trap bites into her ankle, rips away her pallid flesh. The pain in her chest is forgotten, and she's trying to pry the trap open, but she can't.

One of the gunmen appears from between the thick and whitened tree trunks.

Her eyes widen, and she's able to open the trap the slightest bit, but her hands, damp with her own blood, slip, and the trap snaps closed again. The pain overwhelms her, and she screams again, draws the other men to her, draws any Infected who are remotely nearby closer, closer, closer.

"Don't touch her," a small voice demands.

Ellie looks up, blinks the tears out of her eyes, sees a silhouette a few feet away, a shotgun in its hands.

And that's when she blacks out.

"We need to help her."

"Shut up, Caroline. You don't make the rules here."

"But she'll die on her own with a wound like that."

"Not our problem."

Ellie can hear the crackling of a fire, smell the smoke. There's something wrapped around her ankle; it throbs, but it doesn't feel like it's being amputated anymore. She opens her eyes, finds herself inside of a blue sleeping bag.

A woman with blonde hair like Sammy's sits a few feet away, feeding sticks into the fire. Her gaze is fixed on a little girl with chocolate brown hair and soft blue eyes who has a shotgun in her lap.

"Great," the woman says when she sees the redhead try to sit up. "You handle her, Ms. Guardian Angel."

The girl puts the gun aside, saunters over, plops down beside Ellie and gently pats her shoulder. "Relax. You're safe here."

"Did you set that fucking trap?"

"There are Clickers all over the place; it's insurance."

"Shitty insurance."

"It caught you, didn't it?" the girl asks, tilting her head to the side.

Ellie scoffs, finally manages to sit, forces herself to look at her ankle. The skin is black, blue, and red, the veins stand out sharply, and its so swollen that she doubts she could put her boot back on, even if she still had one. "I'm gonna be sick."

The girl covers the wound with a damp cloth. "Then don't stare at it. What were you doin out here without any supplies?"

"I had supplies, I fucking had supplies, but the bandits took my pack. Dammit, they took my note!"

"Your note?" she asks with raised eyebrows. "That's what you're worried about?"

"Fuck you."

"Okay," she says, raising her hands in defense. "Look, if you'd like to be more sociable, I have food."

As soon as the girl stands, Ellie's stomach grumbles, and she blushes.

"That's what I thought."

"Hey," the redhead calls. "Wait. What's your name?"

The girl crosses her arms over her chest. "Caroline."

"Alright, Caroline, I'm sorry. That note is-was really important to me, that's all. Can I leave it at that?" Ellie feels like she should be running back into the forest to find her pack, to find those bandits, but she's immobilized. She's immobilized, and she's tired, and she's hurt, and she's ready to throttle somebody, maybe even this stupid kid.

But she's also starving.

Allowing the smallest smile to twist her lips, Caroline reaches into a bag by the fire, takes out a can, pours its contents into a little wooden bowl. "Hope you like old noodle soup."

Ellie bites back another insult as pain shoots through her ankle. It occurs to her that she doesn't even know where she is; she ran from the shack, but she could have run towards Jackson, away from Jackson, in a direction parallel to Jackson . . .

"Eat," Caroline says, handing over the bowl. "I could carry you, and I don't have much muscle."

"I'm short," Ellie offers, starts shoveling the soup into her mouth.

"Yeah, but I'm eleven. You're what? Sixteen?"

"Fifteen."

"Close enough."

Out of the corner of her eye, she sees the woman skinning a squirrel and spitting into the snow every now and again. "Who is that?"

The younger girl rolls her eyes. "Kelly. She's not your biggest fan."

"That why you carried me?"

"Yeah. She's not my biggest fan either; we met a few months ago, and she took me in, but only because she saw how good my aim is."

Ellie gulps down the rest of the broth and puts the empty bowl on the ground. "You were on your own?"

A glimmer of something appears in Caroline's eyes for a split second, but then it's gone, and she's blank and unreadable. "I was traveling with my parents, but, like I said, there are Clickers all over the place."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be," she says matter-of-factly. "Life if life. If that makes me a cynic, no skin off my bones. Wish I could say the same for you."

"I'll be fine."

"Never doubted it." She lies down on her side in another sleeping back, props her head up on her arm.

"Thanks," the older girl says. "For saving my life."

A grunt in response.

The desire to throttle the poor kid is starting to fade. She feels like she's lost a loved one, maybe because she has. This must be the denial phase; it hasn't hit her yet, not really, not hard. But can she really mourn her mother? They never met, they were never a family, they were never anything.

Her family should be Joel, but she can't be with him, not when he lied to her, not when she kills everyone she loves one way or another. Maybe the Fireflies won't still be in Utah, but they also might be.

What happens if she finds a deserted hospital? Where does she go?

Then again, where is she going now?

"You look like you're having a migraine," Caroline says.

"Huh?"

"I get 'em too."

Ellie takes her shaking hands from her temples, realizes that she must have been rubbing them. Self-consciously, she puts a finger to the space below her nose. No blood.

"It makes sense; you must be pretty stressed. If you weren't, I'd wonder if something was really wrong with you." Caroline picks at dirt underneath her fingernails and yawns.

They listen to the crackling of the fire, stare up at the sky, watch the stars fade in the early pink light of the waking sun.

"Why haven't the bandits attacked us?" Ellie finally asks.

"We've run into them before. They're afraid."

"Wouldn't that make them more likely to make a move while we're asleep."

Caroline laughs. "You don't know cowards when you see them, do you? Those guys are some of the most yellow-bellied people in all of Wyoming."

The redhead allows herself to grin. "You're not yellow, I take it."

Her companion pats her stomach. "None in here to speak of. You?"

"I'd like to think not."

"You were out here on your own. That speaks volumes."

"What if I didn't have a choice?"

"Do you have a gun?"

"Yeah."

"Then you had a choice," Caroline says, twirls a few locks of chocolate brown hair around her finger. "Where you headed, anyway?"

"Out West."

"Obviously. Where you headed?"

Ellie fingers the pendant around her neck. "Utah. Salt Lake City."

"Wow. Quite a journey ahead of you. You're welcome to stay with us until our paths have to diverge; I'd like to keep an eye on that leg of yours."

"Don't worry about it," she responds. "I used to be a sort of nurse in Boston, and it doesn't sound like I'm welcome here."

Caroline shakes her head. "You're welcome if I say you're welcome. What's she going to do? Shoot me? Shoot you?"

They return to silence, and a light snow begins to fall.

"So," she drawls out, "you know my name, but I don't know yours."

David's face again appears in Ellie's mind; he wants her to be honest with him, he wants her to join him, he wants to touch her, to hurt her, to make her beg.

No. This girl isn't David. He went after a child; he was a coward, and Caroline isn't a coward.

"E-Ellie," the redhead says, holds out her hand.

Caroline smirks, shakes it. "Formal, huh?"

"Sometimes."

"Well, I can officially say that I'm glad I didn't leave you to die."

"That makes two of us."

The pendant glistens as snowflakes melt atop its dented and rusted surface.

Right?


End file.
